IN ITS crudest form, the theory goes something like this: ask a supermarket employee where the sausages are, and she’ll take you there. Maybe she’ll even suggest a new type of relish to go with them. After all, it’s in her interest to stop you taking your shopping list to the store down the road. But ask a public sector employee an equivalent question and there are no such market forces driving the quality of the answer that you’ll get.
“That’s one of the distinguishing differences (between the sectors),” says John Tizard, the director of policy and public affairs at Capita Group. “The private sector lives or dies by customer satisfaction and how it responds to customers. The whole organisation has to be focused on the customer.” And it’s just this attitude that Tizard wants the public sector to adopt. He acknowledges that conditions are different, but says that differences are no reason not to share best practice. “I’m not saying that business has all the answers; it doesn’t. But there are actions that can be employed.” For example, encouraging organisations to focus on outcomes rather than process; ensuring that all staff — not just managers or people in customer-facing positions — are offered training opportunities; and institute performance management schemes.
Such schemes aren’t just offering cash bonuses to motivate staff, either. “A big motivator is knowing that your customers are satisfied.” He suggests making sure that staff know how their actions impact on the big picture, whether or not they deal directly with customers, to be able to draw on this motivation-by-delivery. “In a complex service or organisation, staff are often not given the chance to see how they contribute to the end service.”
Of course, Capita has had some very public failures when it comes to servicing its public sector customers. Why, then, should the public sector listen to its advice now? “Look at Capita’s track record, look at how we’ve worked with our staff and our customers to come through challenging times on some projects and have actually made them successful,” he says. “There’s been learning for us but also for the public sector in how it procures and the way it works with companies like Capita.”
If the world changes in the way that Tizard expects, this ability for public and private to work together to deliver public services will become more and more important.
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“Increasingly we are seeing, from political parties of all persuasions, a recognition that we are going to see a greater plurality of providers.” This means that there will be more private companies providing public services which will affect the way that people plan their careers. “You won’t choose . . . to go into one sector and stay there. It will be natural for people to move between the public, private and voluntary sectors.”
As a result, all sectors will need to take a more joined-up approach to training and development. Expect to see more secondments and joint training sessions; more mixed groups studying for management masters; and perhaps more opportunities to learn about sausages from the experts.
FACTFILE: JOHN TIZARD
Born: November 16, 1954, in Colchester
Education: Colchester Royal Grammar School and the London School of Economics
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Career: Began in the voluntary sector, including a stint as the Director of Strategy and Policy at Scope. Joined Capita in 1997 and is now Director of Policy and Public Affairs. He is executive adviser to the CBI’s Public Services Strategy Board; and was a county councillor for more than 18 years, eight of them as joint leader of Bedfordshire County Council.
What he says: “If you are going to make progress in public sector reform you need to move away from the belief that everything is good in the public sector and not in the private sector . . . and recognise that there is a lot of good in both publicly managed and privately managed public services.”