Final report

January 2011

SUSTAINABLE
ORGANISATION
PERFORMANCE
WHAT REALLY MAKES
THE DIFFERENCE?

Shaping the Future interim report 1

Written by Dr Jill Miller with support from
Claire McCartney, Angela Baron, Dr John McGurk
and Vanessa Robinson.

Acknowledgements
We are extremely grateful to the six organisations (and the
individuals within them) who took part in the research.

We would like to thank Dr Valerie Anderson from the

University of Portsmouth for her guidance on methodology
and data analysis.

Additional thanks to everyone who has supported us

throughout the programme.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 2

1 INTRODUCTION AND CONTEXT: SHAPING THE FUTURE 7

2 WHAT WE DID: OUR RESEARCH APPROACH 9

3 WHAT WE FOUND: OUR EIGHT KEY THEMES 12

• Alignment 13
• Shared purpose 17
• Leadership 21
• Locus of engagement 25
• Assessment and evaluation 29
• Balancing short- and long-term horizons 33
• Agility 37
• Capability-building 40

4 SHAPING INSIGHTS AND PROVOCATIONS 43

APPENDICES 46
• Appendix 1: Methodology 47
• Appendix 2: Case study summaries 49
• Appendix 3: Further sources of information 69
• Appendix 4: References 73

Shaping the Future final report 1

Executive summary

Shaping the Future research programme In addition, we have engaged with HR practitioners and
It is not enough for organisations to perform well in the business leaders through round-table events, polls and
short term; organisations need to sustain their performance online discussions to disseminate and review the issues
over time, even through testing economic periods. The raised by the research and prompt action. We have
importance of sustaining the organisation’s people, integrated their views and experiences into the research to
financial, environmental and societal contribution over time ensure our findings are grounded in reality.
therefore needs to be a top priority for HR and business
leaders. We want to help leaders unpick ‘what drives What we did
sustainable organisation performance’ in practice and so, An initial literature review of the drivers of sustainable
for the last two years, we have been undertaking Shaping organisation performance presented three main themes:
the Future, a longitudinal, action research and engagement engagement, leadership and organisational development.
programme. These three themes guided phase 1 of the research, which
was conducted between June and October 2009. Six key
The core research has been conducted with six case study themes emerged from this phase.
organisations from the public and private sectors: BIG
Lottery Fund, Birmingham City Council, NHS Dumfries In the intervening 12 months between phases 1 and 2
and Galloway, Pfizer (Grange Castle), Standard Chartered of the research, we continued to work with our case
and Xerox. These organisations are implementing specific study organisations, having regular discussions with our
change programmes to drive long-term performance. key contacts to keep abreast of their progress on their
change journey. We also used this dialogue to keep up to
We have worked with these six organisations over the date with the challenges and opportunities faced by the
last two years through a period of economic turbulence organisations, brought into sharp focus by the economic
that is still prevailing. The Shaping the Future programme crisis that unravelled during this time.
was designed before the crisis took hold, but subsequent
events have meant we have been in a unique position to Phase 2 of the research was conducted between June and
gain insight into the challenges these six organisations have October 2010 and was designed to examine in more detail
faced and the creative ways they have approached them. the six themes that our phase 1 research had indicated
Successful organisations sustain their performance through were important for long-term performance. We looked for
both good and bad times and we have had the opportunity evidence that supported or contradicted our assertions, as
to examine what really makes the difference. well as for further, emergent themes.

As well as advancing knowledge through our research What’s driving sustainable organisation
and presenting our key insights, a central aim of the performance?
programme is to drive practice. We have built a vibrant Our phase 2 research confirmed the importance of the six
community of practitioners to share knowledge and debate themes from phase 1 as drivers of long-term performance:
the issues raised through the research. Currently almost alignment, shared purpose, locus of engagement,
11,000 people are signed up to this dedicated Shaping the assessment and evaluation, balancing short- and long-term
Future network. horizons. Two additional themes also emerged from phase 2
of the work: agility and capability-building.

2 Shaping the Future final report

Table 1: The eight themes that are important for sustainable organisation performance

THEME OUR DEFINITIONS

Alignment Perceptions of consistency, fit, links or integration between the values,
behaviours or objectives of different stakeholders, both internal and
external and with the organisation purpose.
Shared purpose An organisation’s purpose is its identity, the reason why it exists and the
golden thread to which its strategy should be aligned. Shared purpose
takes the connection with the organisational purpose one step further
to be shared by all employees and often beyond, to include external
stakeholders.
Leadership Senior leaders articulate a future-oriented vision in an appropriate style
that informs decision-making and empowers employees to achieve
organisational effectiveness. The ability to lead, however, is not confined
to senior leaders and can be demonstrated at all levels.
Locus of engagement People can be engaged at different levels and with various aspects of
the organisation or the work and their engagement can be transactional
or emotional in nature.
Assessment and evaluation The processes that occur at different organisational levels to gather
qualitative and quantitative information, to assess the impact of actions
and inform decision-making.
Balancing short- and long-term Active awareness, management and communication of both known and
horizons unknown organisational issues and pressures affecting the short term
(of less than a one-year timeframe) while maintaining an active focus on
longer-term priorities (with longer than a one-year timeframe).
Agility The ability to stay open to new directions and be continually proactive,
helping to assess the limits or risks of existing approaches and ensuring
that leaders and followers have an agile and change-ready mindset
to enable them, and ultimately the organisation, to keep moving,
changing, adapting.
Capability-building Equipping the people in the organisation with the skills and knowledge
they need to meet both present and future challenges. Also identifying
existing necessary and potential capabilities, ensuring they are accessible
across the organisation. Capability-building applies not only to
individuals, but also to teams and organisations.

Shaping the Future final report 3

What does this mean for practice? Provocations
From our eight themes we have developed ten insights • Do you know how aligned your organisation really is?
for HR practitioners and business leaders about what will • Has your level of alignment prevented you from
really make the difference for the long-term performance challenging the status quo or doing something
of organisations. For each insight we pose provocations differently?
that are rooted in the evidence. They are intended to • Could the level of alignment you aspire to in
prompt and challenge HR and business leaders to appraise your organisation inadvertently inhibit sustainable
how their organisation currently operates, assess the performance?
sustainability of existing approaches and drive action where
appropriate. These insights and provocations are:
3  Shared purpose can only be achieved by finding
1  The organisation change response needs to be the human connection beyond profit or short-term
truly agile and enduring, not a knee-jerk reaction efficiency measures
that quickly dissipates Organisations can’t impose a sense of shared purpose
Sometimes when organisations need to change it’s easy and manipulated top–down selling of a common purpose
to confuse a one-off reaction for proactive agility. If the creates cynicism and resistance. Shared purpose is not
organisation reverts back to its steady state when the just for charities or the public sector. By encouraging
pressure eases, it may be that the change-ready mindset employees to find their own meaning at work, they
and skills of individuals, and the structures and systems connect and create a true sense of what they are at
to deliver lasting ‘generative’ agility are missing. Together work to do, that’s beyond profits or short-term efficiency
these components enable organisations to be open to measures and regardless of the sector they operate in.
new directions, assess the limitations and risks of existing
approaches, and keep moving and adapting.
Provocations
Provocations • Have you genuinely engaged with employees on your
shared purpose?
• How are employees developing agile mindsets,
• Are you confident your employees would agree?
including having the courage to challenge, being
• Where is your evidence?
curious and collaborative?
• Are managers permissive or dismissive in letting
employees take the reins of change?
4  Collaborative leadership brings sustainability,
• Since your last crisis, what has changed long term so don’t default to directive and driven when the
and what are you really doing differently? going gets tough
Collaborative leaders support sustainable performance.
2  It’s a fine balance between alignment and In periods of great flux and economic uncertainty,
flexibility sometimes decisions need to be made quickly and
Organisational alignment, between the values, decisively but this should only be for the short term
behaviours and objectives of internal and external and not a default setting. Reinforcing a collaborative
stakeholders, and with the organisation purpose, is problem-sharing approach can drive longer-term,
critical. But, too strong or rigid alignment can block sustainable change, agility and engagement.
performance, overemphasise short-term needs and
stifle agility. To prevent this, alignment must be
balanced with flexibility to enable the organisation to Provocations
morph and change. • How well do you understand the real leadership style
of your organisation and the impact it has?
• Is your leadership style genuinely collaborative? If not,
for how long is a directive approach sustainable?
• Do your leaders have the capability to flex their
leadership style?

4 Shaping the Future final report

5 ‘Middle management’ have a valuable 7 Truly understanding employees’ locus of
transforming and translating role but are often engagement can avoid the risk of over-attachment
bypassed rather than refocused, reskilled and and underperformance
leveraged Organisations need to get under the surface of
At a time of job cuts and role scrutiny, the temptation employees’ engagement and better understand what
is to bypass or cut out middle managers who are locus (a particular aspect of work or the organisation)
often perceived as performance blockers. Instead of individuals are engaged with. If people become too
focusing on delayering this middle tier of the workforce, connected to one thing, this can undermine sustainable
organisations should look at smart rewiring to maximise performance and loyalty to the organisation.
organisational capability. Suitably skilled and refocused
middle managers play a key role as transformers and In times of labour market insecurity, high engagement
translators. Their transforming role is in bringing scores can mislead managers. Having a job may mean
change to life and as translators they facilitate two-way employees are temporarily engaged in the short term,
communications between leaders and the front line. but the fixed-grin mask soon slips.

Provocations Provocations
• Do your leaders bypass the middle management in • How meaningful is your measure of engagement?
times of change? • Have you got a handle on employees’ locus of
• Do your middle managers have the capability to be engagement? Are they engaged with their team, their
both transformers and translators? customers, their line manager, their organisation or
• Is your management development informed by a real something else?
understanding of the value-adding capacity of middle • Don’t be seduced by statistics: do you pay attention
managers? to the nuances when action planning?

6A
 n over-focus on today’s needs is not true talent 8  Perceptions of unfairness undermine employee
management; it’s talent tunnel vision engagement
A focus on organisation capability that neglects to Misaligned practices and inconsistencies, such as in
see that it’s built on individual-level capability is set up management behaviour or career opportunities, can
to fail. Often organisations pay too little attention to lead to perceptions of unfairness or organisational
identifying and developing the capabilities individuals injustice. This negatively impacts on employee
will need in the long term. This implies a leadership/ engagement and is a blocker to performance. In tough
talent management capability gap with too much focus economic times these perceptions of injustice are rife.
on the operational needs of today rather than the
organisational imperatives of tomorrow.
Provocations
• Do people in your organisation feel they are being
Provocations treated unfairly?
• Are short-term pressures impacting on, or even • As a result, do you understand who, or what, in the
driving, your talent planning? organisation they feel disengaged from?
• Does your organisation have the capability to assess • Are such perceptions of organisational injustice
what future technical skills and behaviours are founded on misalignment or inconsistencies, or is it
needed? just organisational grumbling?
• Do those responsible for talent-planning act on this
knowledge?

Shaping the Future final report 5

9  Process-heavy organisations are often still Parallels with other CIPD work
insight-light The findings clearly resonate with related CIPD work and
When organisations are saturated with data, why in particular our Next Generation HR research. While both
don’t insights emerge? Is it the wrong data? Is it a projects take a different starting point – Next Generation
lack of time, capability and/or confidence to challenge HR is more specifically centred on HR and looks further
upwards? forward − each is strongly focused on, and acknowledges
the importance of, exploring sustainable performance.
For optimal impact, organisations need to constantly
review and cull data collection processes that don’t And there are interesting parallels in the findings. Each
add value. An overemphasis on backward-looking project highlights the importance of agility to sustained
targets defends existence but doesn’t prove worth. performance – Shaping the Future talks of the need
Rather, organisations need to use the data, make the for leaders and followers to have an agile and change-
connections and be curious to uncover real insight. ready mindset, while Next Generation HR emphasises the
importance of HR creating a living strategy that responds
Provocations quickly to macro trends and opportunities. Both talk about
getting the balance right between organisational alignment
• Are you collecting data for the sake of it? When was
and flexibility.
the last time you challenged/removed a data process
that was not delivering?
Another shared message is around the vital role that
• What is the missing link to move from data to insight?
insight can play, with organisations often being data-heavy
• Are you really looking forward or just measuring the but insight-light. Organisations need to use data, make
past? connections and be curious to uncover real insight that
drives strong performance. Both projects also highlight
10  Leaders don’t always know best about the long- the importance of establishing a shared purpose that
term vision is understood throughout and beyond organisations,
In good times, organisations can get by through something that is also underlined in our Shared Purpose:
repeating short-term business cycles. In less certain The golden thread? research.
times and for truly sustainable performance, long-term
vision needs to be more than this. Employees can be Finally, we can also see parallels between our findings
the early warning system – in other words, they can and some of the issues coming through from the CIPD’s
be the early detectors of threats and opportunities. quarterly Employee Outlook survey of more than 2,000
Effective mechanisms for upwards communications – respondents, with employees wanting greater collaborative
that filter the important signals from the ground from leadership, two-way communication and feedback, and
the background noise – can reap dividends and inform line managers with better behavioural and soft skills.
longer-term planning.
Continuing to drive practice
Provocations Over the next few months we will be developing practical
resources around our key themes. We will also be
• Is vision-scanning and -setting a two-way process or
undertaking further research into specific issues that have
a management monologue in your organisation?
emerged from the Shaping the Future programme as
• Do you capture the views of employees about long-
important if organisations are to sustain their performance
term vision?
over the long term.
• Should middle management be empowered to
facilitate this? We’d be interested in your thoughts on this report, so
please let us know if you have any feedback. Similarly, if
you haven’t already done so, you can join our dedicated
Shaping the Future network to access further resources
and related CIPD work that can help drive practice in your
organisation: cipd.co.uk/shapingthefuture

6 Shaping the Future final report

 1 1

Introduction and context:

Shaping the Future

Why sustainable organisation performance? We feel this is a timely opportunity to address this gap.
The overarching question we set out to answer in our A central aim of the programme is to provide practical
Shaping the Future research programme was: what drives insights for business leaders generally, and for HR
sustainable organisation performance? Sustainability is the professionals in particular, as they look at ways to ensure
key issue for HR and business leaders across the globe and they add disproportionate value in their organisation.
the current climate has increased the need for organisations
to focus on how they will ensure long-term prosperity. This report presents the findings from the two-year
At the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development research programme we have undertaken with six case
(CIPD) we believe sustainability refers to an organisation’s study organisations. Our aim here is not to give an
people, financial, environmental and societal contribution academic account of the research, but to provide learning
over time. and insights that practitioners can apply to create change in
their organisations and so really drive performance for the
At the same time, much has been said and written about long term.
the short-term nature of UK business. Fixed on executive
reward and short-term fluctuations in the share price, The Shaping the Future programme does not operate in
managers struggle to look a year ahead, let alone five isolation but builds on other work that the CIPD and other
or ten. So while in theory the importance of sustaining research organisations have done. For example, the findings
performance over time is well known, the issue that closely resonate with our Next Generation HR research.
remains is how this can be achieved. While both projects take a different starting point – Next
Generation is more centred on HR and is further forward

Figure 1: Components of organisation sustainability

People Financial

Environmental Societal

Shaping the Future final report 7

looking – each is strongly focused on and acknowledges Engaging with practitioners to drive action
the importance of sustainable performance, and there are Shaping the Future is about driving practice by developing
interesting parallels in the findings. To find out more about insights rooted in research. Unlike previous research
this research project, see cipd.co.uk/nextgen carried out by the CIPD, we aimed to go beyond a focused
research project to also build a community of practice to
The unique context share knowledge and understanding and debate the issues
The last two years have been a challenging time for all, so as the research progressed. Throughout the life of the
working with our six case study organisations throughout programme we have been engaging with HR practitioners
this period was a unique opportunity. We were able to and business leaders to disseminate and review the
follow them on their specific change journeys (the basis issues raised by the research and prompt action. We have
for their initial selection as case studies) and in their pursuit integrated their views and experiences into the research to
of sustainable performance more generally. We could ensure our findings are grounded in reality.
also capture the learning that emerged in response to the
challenges faced during these difficult times. As we write this, almost 11,000 people are signed up
to our dedicated Shaping the Future network to debate
The downturn has resulted in significant pressure on each the research findings through online polls, discussions
case study organisation to cut costs and make efficiency and invitations to round-table events on specific themes
savings while still meeting the objectives of their various from the project. The round-table events have been held
change programmes. They have to manage their business throughout the UK as well as in Romania and Turkey.
operations as efficiently as possible in the short term while
being constantly mindful that performing well in the long Informed by our research findings, we will be developing
term is a necessity for all. practical resources to help practitioners develop action
around some of the key insights that our research has
Successful organisations sustain their performance over revealed are important to ensure their organisations are fit
time, not just in the short term or through good economic for the long term. We will also be undertaking some further
periods. In harder economic times, repeated short-term, research into specific issues that have emerged from the
and often profit-driven, strategies might not deliver. Rather, core Shaping the Future work.
organisations need to keep an eye both on and over the
horizon, and build in true agility to change and adapt as Summary
needed. For our case studies this has meant relooking at The aim of Shaping the Future is to provide practical
both what they want to achieve and how they need to knowledge and guidance to HR professionals and business
operate. leaders, informed by the research. This report presents the
findings and unique insights that we have developed.
The drivers for long-term performance can
be better unpicked through gaining multiple The next section of the report outlines how we conducted
perspectives the research. We present what we found – grouped under
The longitudinal approach we have adopted has made it eight key themes – in section 3 and then in section 4 we
possible to gain deep insight into what is really important present key insights with some provocative questions
for long-term performance. We held interviews and aiming to challenge and prompt both HR practitioners
focus groups with people from different functions and and business leaders and ultimately to drive long-term
at different levels in the organisations, from front-line performance in their organisations.
employees to senior leaders. Using this approach in both
phases of the research enabled us to gain a more holistic
view of issues faced.

8 Shaping the Future final report

 2
What we did:
our research approach

We designed a longitudinal, action research programme, These case studies were selected as they are undergoing
using ‘deep-dive’ case study methods, semi-structured compelling organisational change journeys. Each of our six
interviews and focus groups to examine the drivers of organisations differed in its focus, operating environment,
performance for the long term. and the challenges and outcomes it experienced. Table 2
provides background information on each case study and
Our case studies further detail about each can be found in Appendix 2.
The core research has been conducted with six case study
organisations from both public and private sectors: BIG
Lottery Fund, Birmingham City Council, NHS Dumfries and
Galloway, Pfizer (Grange Castle), Standard Chartered and
Xerox.

Table 2: Summary of case study organisations

NO. OF
CASE STUDY TYPE OF ORGANISATION RESEARCH FOCUS EMPLOYEES
BIG Lottery Fund Non-departmental public body, Adoption of an ‘intelligent 950
distributing lottery money to funding’ approach to the way
good causes employees operate to evaluate
projects, allocate funding and
assess the impact of that funding
Birmingham City Council Large, public sector Business transformation 4,300 within A&C
(in particular the Adults and programme, changing the way
Communities Directorate) the council delivers services
NHS Dumfries and Galloway Public sector, health service Management development – skills 4,543
for continuous improvement
Standard Chartered, Hong Large, multinational bank Driving employee engagement 5,000 in Hong Kong
Kong
Pfizer (Grange Castle), Ireland Private sector, biopharmaceutical Lean transformation and 1,200
continuous improvement
Xerox (one of the dedicated Multinational, document and Capturing the learning about 94
Global Document Outsourcing print management services innovation and customer focus
(GDO) service delivery teams) within GDO

Shaping the Future final report 9

 Figure 2: A longitudinal, action research design

Phase 1 Phase 2
June – October Action phase June – October
2009 2010

How we conducted the research leadership; locus of engagement; assessment and

An extensive literature review indicated that the drivers of evaluation, and balancing short- and long-term horizons.
sustainable organisation performance can be categorised
within three main themes: leadership, engagement and Further detail about our phase 1 findings can be found in
organisational development, and these therefore initially our interim report at: cipd.co.uk/shapingthefuture
guided phase 1 of our research. Phase 1 was conducted
between June and October 2009 (Figure 2). In the Research into action
intervening period between phases 1 and 2, we maintained At the end of phase 1, we discussed the findings with our
contact with our case study organisations to follow them case study organisations and suggested some actions or
on their journeys. Phase 2 of the research was conducted areas for development. We maintained a regular dialogue
between June and October 2010. with them in the intervening ‘action period’ between
phases 1 and 2. In this way we could stay close to the
In both phases we conducted semi-structured interviews and issues and challenges they were facing, both internally
focus groups in each organisation, taking a ‘deep slice’ by and from the wider environment. We discussed the
talking to people at different levels and across functions. A organisations’ progress on their specific change journeys
detailed methodology is included in Appendix 1. and also any action they had taken as a result of our
suggestions from the phase 1 research. We also used the
Practitioner engagement opportunity to keep abreast of new challenges coming over
Engagement with, and feedback from, practitioners was the horizon and any changes to their strategic goals.
central to this work as the aim of this programme is to
provide practical insights that HR professionals can use in Phase 2 of the research
their own organisations. In both phases of the research In phase 2 we investigated further the six themes that had
we held round-table discussions to debate the research emerged from phase 1, looking for evidence that supported
themes. These have been held throughout the UK as well or contradicted our assertions, as well as remaining open to
as in Romania and Turkey. We also regularly engaged with any further, emergent themes. We also examined the data
our dedicated Shaping the Future network (to which almost collected during the action phase through our touch points.
11,000 people are currently signed up), through online
polls and discussions to debate themes emerging from the Analysing the data
research, and our quarterly newsletter. These activities have The extensive data we collected across the six case studies
informed the research as well as helped to drive practice. through 47 interviews and 15 focus groups was analysed
systematically. We developed a coding process linked to
Our findings from phase 1 of the research the existing six themes from phase 1 and expanded the
Using leadership, engagement and organisation coding system when we saw evidence of further, emergent
development as our guide to investigate what really drives themes. We remained open to data that both supported
sustainable organisation performance, our data revealed and contradicted the importance of the themes. Having
six key themes: alignment; shared purpose; distributed coded the data, we then examined it through a process of

10 Shaping the Future final report

2 What we did: our research approach

discussion facilitated by an external partner to the research

team, who challenged and probed our themes.

Phase 2 findings
Within the broad areas of engagement, organisational
development and leadership, our analysis confirmed the
importance of the six themes from phase 1 of the research
and helped us further develop them. Two further themes
also emerged: agility and capability-building. These eight
themes are discussed in the next section with illustrative
examples and quotes.

From these eight themes, we have developed ten insights

and provocations, grounded in the research findings,
to both support and challenge organisations looking to
further develop their future approaches to organisational
sustainability. These provocations are detailed in section 4.

Shaping the Future final report 11

3
What we found:
our eight key themes

Introduction more depth in phase 2 of the research, we found it to be

Eight themes have emerged from the two phases of our broader and more complex than originally assumed and so
research that, combined, we believe support organisation have now termed it ‘leadership’.
performance both for today and for the longer term. These
are illustrated in Figure 3. In this section we will look at each of the eight themes
in turn, drawing out the aspects of each that we believe
Six of these themes were identified in phase 1: shared are important for sustaining performance over the long
purpose, locus of engagement, distributed leadership, term. We include illustrative examples and verbatim quotes
alignment, balancing the short- and long-term horizons, from our case studies to bring them alive. In practice these
and assessment and evaluation. Phase 2 of the research themes are inter-related, and we indicate for each theme
confirmed the importance of these six themes and we where we see some key crossovers. We also indicate, where
identified two emergent themes: agility and capability- relevant, any changes we saw between the two phases of
building. The phase 1 insight of ‘distributed leadership’ research in terms of how these themes were manifest.
referred to the importance for long-term performance of
people at all levels of the organisations assuming leadership In Appendix 3, we provide details of further resources
roles to different extents. After examining this insight in relating to each of these themes that you might find useful.

Figure 3: Eight themes of sustainable organisation performance

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12 Shaping the Future final report

 Cap
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• Job roles should be clearly aligned to higher-level objectives.
• Attitudes and behaviour need to reflect organisational values.
• Systems and processes need to be aligned with organisational priorities.
• Internal alignment is critical, but it is also important for organisations to be mindful of
external alignment.

Definition: Perceptions of consistency, fit, links or At Pfizer Grange Castle, continuous improvement systems
integration between the values, behaviours or objectives of and area targets linked to the bonus system mean that
different stakeholders, both internal and external and with people know what their role is and how that contributes to
the organisation purpose. their team and the site’s performance.

Alignment and sustainable organisation

performance At Standard Chartered Bank there are processes in place to
Alignment was referred to in different ways across all enable individuals to understand the regulatory pressures on
of our case study organisations. Alignment alludes to the business and how they could respond to these to ensure
the degree to which employees’ perceptions of the they fulfil the requirements of their job.
organisation, its aims and objectives are consistent and
fit with other messages regarding values, behaviours and ‘People are focused on the whole perspective priorities and
organisational priorities. It also embraces the perceptions needs; they are getting the big picture of what we’re trying
of different stakeholders that may be either internal – to get to.’
such as employee groups, employee representatives,
managers, senior leaders – or external – such as customers, One vehicle for alignment is through cascading objectives
shareholders or supply chain organisations. Alignment and there was a wealth of evidence that our case study
can go beyond people to include infrastructure, systems organisations were striving to achieve a clear line of sight
and processes. Each of these various aspects of alignment from organisation through manager, team and individual
impacts on sustainable performance. objectives.

Job roles should be clearly aligned to higher- At BIG Lottery there is agreement about the role of
level objectives objectives in ensuring everyone is clear about what is
One aspect of alignment is the degree of clarity individuals required in their role:
have about their own role and the extent to which they
understand how this fits with the responsibilities of ‘They are aligned without a doubt. Everyone’s individual
others and the contribution they are making to both objectives in their appraisal link to a corporate objective
organisational objectives and business success. which links into the strategic corporate plan and the
strategic framework, so in terms of a structural thing they
are aligned. I personally know that by doing that objective,
I contribute to the organisational objective.’

Shaping the Future final report 13

 Senior managers at Birmingham City Council talked of the In NHS Dumfries and Galloway, the Delivering Dynamic
value in aligning what people do in their job roles with the Improvement (DDI) programme is a knowledge-sharing,
overall objectives of the council. cross-functional learning and continuous improvement
programme. It was designed to get the organisation to
‘We are starting to see that golden thread right back work across professional boundaries on the common goal of
through that journey about meeting the council’s objectives patient experience. DDI’s legacy is clear:
against the council plan.’
‘If I see a team next door, whether it’s a team of dieticians,
Employees are able to see what success looks like and it’s team of nurses who have been really successful at doing
helpful to see, ‘how your targets fit into the bigger picture’. something more efficiently I can maybe go and look at what
they’ve done and how they’ve gone about it. Then I can say,
“Okay you’re not doing the same thing“ but what process
Attitudes and behaviour need to reflect
did they go through to get to that?’
organisational values
Alignment is more than simply ensuring objectives line up
in a structural way. Objectives need to be clear, not just in Systems and processes need to be aligned
terms of what performance levels are expected, but also with organisational priorities
the behaviours that are expected from people in achieving When systems and processes were not consistent with
them. Values and attitudes are important shapers of culture the organisation’s priorities, this could be damaging
and behaviour, so it is important they are aligned with or demotivating. This was particularly the case when
each other and that they support activities critical to the employees felt that systems were out of sync with their
organisation’s performance, such as customer service or objective of doing their best for customers or when they
innovation. believed they were not given the space to try new ideas or
ways of doing things.
At Pfizer (Grange Castle) significant effort is being put into
Internal alignment is critical
aligning behaviour not just with performance, but with the
A theme that emerged strongly was the importance of
values of the organisation and communicating clearly what
knowledge-sharing and cross-functional working. Our case
they expect from their employees. HR provided examples
where they had openly challenged unacceptable behaviour
study organisations talked about the benefits of this and
even when the individuals were high-performing overall in
of learning from others’ experiences for efficiency and for
terms of output. providing a seamless service to the customer.

Management behaviour was cited as a potential blocker to At Standard Chartered, ensuring that functions work
together to provide a comprehensive service to the customer
performance when it did not reflect the espoused values
and operate as ‘One Bank’ is a key priority. This seamless
of the organisation or acted as a barrier with regards to
service will contribute to further differentiating the bank
specific initiatives such as development programmes/
from its competitors. A few employees talked about ways
information-sharing projects. In organisations where there
that working together can help generate more business.
were distinct professional groups, there was a sense of
difficulty in getting alignment when it involved trying to cut ‘So what I’m saying is we should have the retail banking
across professional boundaries. and the wholesale banking people working together with
us. It’s not just referring business – we should go out more.
We are starting already to go out more on joint calls. It’s not
just one-way traffic; it’s in exchange. I can pass on things to
them and they can also give something to us which would
create a lot of opportunities to improve profitability.’

14 Shaping the Future final report

 At BIG a lot of effort had been put into improving cross- However, external alignment is also important for private
functional working and knowledge-sharing since phase 1. sector organisations.
There were a number of initiatives in place that clearly had
an impact on the understanding and degree of role clarity
The external environment at Standard Chartered has
being experienced by individuals.
changed since phase 1 of the research, which was
‘There is a more realistic approach to the exchange of conducted just after the Lehmann collapse. Although
learning and knowledge. We are developing forums for there is a common feeling that the bank rode the financial
people to exchange ideas and a wiki to build learning. I am tsunami well – it is now in its seventh year of substantial
pleased to see people developing these things as well as growth – its activities have been affected by the aftermath
tools for commissioning programmes effectively. These are of the crisis. This has manifested itself in increased
all good developments and are really helping to build our regulation and the need to keep growing consumer
learning and assess our outcomes more effectively.’ confidence in banking, which Standard Chartered is doing
by concentrating on getting the basics of banking right.

A lack of alignment around knowledge-sharing and ‘I think business-wise the environment is a lot better this
cross-functional working caused frustration and impacted year than last year. And what we need to work on is
performance. rebuilding the public’s confidence in the banking sector.’

Line managers/supervisors felt that often teams were

reinventing the wheel and not learning from other teams’ The economic situation in Ireland significantly worsened
successes and mistakes. Where shared learning did take over the last 12 months and, although this hasn’t
place this was because people had used their own initiative negatively impacted on Grange Castle, it served to remind
to talk to each other and if you had a good manager or a employees how fortunate they are to have job security.
boss in common ‘who pushed you to see who else does this This feeling was also heightened by future divestitures by
in your area’. Pfizer across other sites in Ireland. There is also a sense
that the economic crisis has increased the focus and
demands of regulatory bodies and maintaining a focus on
But it is also important for organisations to be the global marketplace.
mindful of external alignment
A related issue was the extent to which organisations were ‘I’m definitely happy to have a job.’
aligned with the external world. This was particularly evident
in those organisations either operating in or having strong
links with the public sector, which had seen enormous Shifts from phase 1 to phase 2
pressures on costs. In phase 1, interviewees talked about the importance
of vertical alignment but in phase 2 there was a greater
emphasis on horizontal alignment within the organisation,
At NHS Dumfries and Galloway managers were well aware
in terms of both behaviour and attitudes through cross-
that they needed to align their service to social trends and
the changing needs of the patient community. They were
functional working. For example, the need to promote
also increasingly aware of the impact of the spending review
cross-functional working and knowledge-sharing, both
and its impact on budget and resources. in terms of business-as-usual tasks and in the context of
change. Many of our case study organisations have put
actions in place to improve efficiencies in these areas or as
part of a focus on the customer.
At Birmingham City Council, while the impact of the
spending review is accelerating plans already in place to In addition, alignment with external parties has become
restructure, it is also having implications for the expectations even more important in phase 2 of the research for all
of staff about the kind of service they are able to deliver for case studies. The difficult economic situation has made it
the people of Birmingham.
essential to work even more closely with external agencies,

Shaping the Future final report 15

providers and customers to ensure that high-quality goods
and services are provided. The drive for external alignment
is particularly marked in the public sector with the
widescale changes being experienced.

Relationships to other insights

The issue of alignment is closely related to shared purpose,
with organisation alignment enhanced through having a
common shared purpose. Alignment is also linked to an
organisation’s ability to respond to short- and long-term
issues and to assessment and evaluation as it is important for
organisations to have clear, cascaded objectives at all levels
linked to the overall strategy for long-term performance.

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• Shared purpose is strongest when employees emotionally connect with it.
• It is stronger when integrated into targets and performance.
• Shared purpose should be leveraged through periods of uncertainty and change.
• Organisations need to balance the achievement of their core purpose with a focus
on efficiencies.
• Shared purpose can be compromised by conflicting priorities or structural changes.

Definition: An organisation’s purpose is its identity, the

reason why it exists and the golden thread to which its People at all levels of Birmingham City Council have
strategy should be aligned. Shared purpose takes the embraced the core purpose of the organisation. Employees
have interpreted the core purpose of the council in terms
connection with the organisational purpose one step
of what it means for their job role, suggesting they have
further to a purpose that is shared by all employees and
internalised it.
often beyond to include external stakeholders.
‘To ensure the citizens of Birmingham can contact BCC
Shared purpose and sustainable organisation by whatever method they choose and get highest quality
performance information or service which gives value for money.’
Organisation purposes need to be simple and clearly
articulated so that individuals can make sense of them in ‘The core purpose of BCC is to provide services to citizens of
their roles and reflect them in their behaviours. To enable Birmingham.’
sustainable organisation performance, employees also need
Similarly, in this second phase of the research, managers
to develop a strong (ideally emotional) shared connection
within the focus group talked about the strength of their
or bond to an organisation’s core purpose.
personal motivation to fulfil the core purpose of delivering
a good service to the people of Birmingham and improving
Shared purpose is strongest when employees people’s lives as they felt an emotional connection to it.
emotionally connect with it
When we explored shared purpose in our case study
organisations, it seemed strongest when employees Shared purpose is also enhanced if employees are able to
developed an emotional connection with it. You could make sense of the organisation purpose, internalise it and
argue that this is easier for some of the public sector practise it in their daily routines.
organisations than some of our other case studies, but this
is not necessarily the case. At Standard Chartered Bank,
for instance, employees have an emotional connection
with the bank’s reputation and the many corporate social
responsibility (CSR) and volunteering opportunities that are
open to them. At Pfizer (Grange Castle), employees have
an emotional connection with improving patients’ lives,
and at Xerox Global Document Outsourcing (GDO) Service
Delivery team, employees have a strong bond around
providing excellent customer service.

Shaping the Future final report 17

 At Pfizer (Grange Castle) there seems to be a strong sense At Dumfries and Galloway, the core purpose of the
of shared purpose despite the changes accompanied by the organisation has not changed. Put simply, it’s to provide
merger. The majority of interviewees focus on producing quality healthcare while reducing health inequalities in the
good-quality drugs or have developed an emotional region. Behind it is a quartet of drivers: quality, people,
connection to improving patients’ lives, and this has been safety and service. For the CEO John Burns, the purpose
reinforced by recent poster campaigns and a powerful is understood across departments and its importance is
presentation at the summer leadership conference. integrated into targets and performance.

There is also a sense of pride in Grange Castle’s

achievements: Shared purpose should be leveraged through
periods of uncertainty and change
‘I think the site has created its own opportunities because of
Developing a sense of shared purpose becomes even more
its successes. Part of that success is due to the people that
important in an uncertain economic climate. As the public
work here and what we’ve built up over the last eight years.
sector faces mounting pressures, those organisations that
There’s new products coming here, and really that’s as a
are able to align their (in some cases, new) purposes, values
result of our successes.’
and goals for all employees will have a clear head start.

Encouraging employees to engage with the organisation’s There is also recognition from employees who work with
activities in the community presents a double dividend for people negatively affected by the recession that their
organisations. Employees who are driven by and care for organisation’s purpose and the work that they do on a daily
the customer, community and humanity are more engaged basis is even more vital.
and motivated if they perceive the organisation genuinely
shares their ethical values. Stakeholders respect and value
A sense of purpose is evident across NHS Dumfries and
an organisation that links what it does to something bigger.
Galloway and arguably the colder climate that the board
now finds itself operating in has increased the impetus
Organisations need to know what community and towards sharing this core purpose. We found that individuals
societal issues switch on their employees and encourage across the organisation were able to articulate the core
opportunities to get involved. purpose as being about improving healthcare and patient
care and reducing healthcare inequalities in the region.
At Standard Chartered there is a clear sense of purpose The critical financial environment means that attention is
shared across all our interviewees. Many have developed skewed towards the financial side of the equation. But the
an emotional connection to the bank and this seems senior team and the general managers are making it clear
heightened by the ‘Here for Good’ campaign. that finance is only one leg of the table and that all of the
other aspects need to be delivered as well. This is certainly
A shared motivation and engagement to go the extra mile challenging, as Hazel Borland, Director of Nursing and
is also demonstrated by many employees for the good of Midwifery, explains:
the company, the customer and the community. This is also
apparent in the strong team spirit and sense of family across ‘The priorities are the same as they were this time last
a number of areas. year. We’ve got a purpose that’s twofold: one is to reduce
health inequalities for the population of NHS Dumfries and
Galloway and the second is to deliver safe, effective, efficient,
Shared purpose is stronger when integrated reliable and excellent care for any patients that come
through our doors. Now that’s the same purpose as we had
into targets and performance
12 months ago and that’s not changed and we absolutely
Several of our case study organisations were strengthening
recognise that we’ll do that through providing staff with the
shared purpose by developing ways of integrating shared
right environment, through capturing the enthusiasm of staff
objectives, values and behaviours into employees’ targets
and through identifying efficiencies for improvement. And
and performance management systems.
that’s exactly the same as it was a year ago.’

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Organisations need to balance the Yet shared purpose can be compromised by
achievement of their core purpose with a conflicting priorities or structural changes
focus on efficiencies Shared purpose can be significantly weakened by
With increasing pressure to reduce costs and focus on organisation environment changes such as the shift from a
efficiencies, organisations need to ensure that their core small organisation to a global organisation or by different
purpose is not negatively impacted. For many of our case parts of the organisation having conflicting or even
studies there is recognition that their core purpose must competing objectives. When this occurs, leaders need to re-
remain the same, but the way in which it is achieved might assert the wider organisational purpose and future vision.
have to change.

At Pfizer (Grange Castle) the acquisitions initially left some

At Dumfries and Galloway common purpose is driven in the people feeling less certain about their future. Some people
new environment with a laser-like focus on cost reduction. had noticed a difference shifting from a campus site feel to a
However, the CEO is determined, as are the key managers, much larger organisation. Senior managers emphasised the
that this will not result in an over-focus on costs at the importance of communication and ‘building a vision for the
expense of quality, people and service. His commitment future’.
means that the organisation will balance the challenge of
seeking to drive costs out of the system with ensuring that
quality, safety and motivation don’t suffer. That’s a very big
Almost without exception managers and employees alike
ask but employees are already taking it on board, especially
agreed that BIG engenders a sense of shared purpose
those at management levels.
among its workforce and that this is important for
‘I suppose to my mind it’s about how we still try to deliver performance. However, a few interviewees expressed doubts
the same service, but being more efficient around that. I’ve that there is a uniform view across the organisation.
just come from a meeting and it’s all about change and
‘At one level there is a feeling that most people have a
efficiency; but it’s how can we still provide the same service
high respect for what we do. People put the extra time in
but do it differently, with the skill mix we have.’
and are conscientious. But if you take a diagonal slice and
ask people to describe how they add value you would get
different messages. Not sure there is a shared values base.
Birmingham City Council’s core purpose remains the same, People would attach descriptors to their areas but they are
which is its strength, but the way the purpose will be not shared across the organisation.’
achieved is changing. Even though fewer resources are
available, there is an obvious determination among staff to ‘The majority of people do have a sense of shared purpose.
deliver on the purpose. Interviewees talked about needing However, I think its works different in different areas and
to deliver on the core purpose in a more integrated way and works less well where there are conflicts between elements
how it is necessary to break down cross-functional barriers in of organisation in terms of resources or approaches to
order to achieve it. the workload, or where they see themselves as a slightly
separate entity.’
‘To understand where you actually fit into the organisation
and how your service actually contributes to the aim of
not only the directorate but the City as well, so maybe it is
looking at how you work across different directorates and One thing that seemed to work against shared purpose in
different types of services.’ some of our organisations was the perceptions across some
departments of competing objectives. In these instances
‘We have to join and collaborate together really and not to the department’s objectives were taking priority over the
have a group that sits on its own and thinks very detached wider organisation’s purpose and creating an ‘us and them’
thoughts really. So in a sense there is a really strong sense of mentality. With the importance of role-modelling already
common purpose and shared purpose in the organisation now.’ emphasised, heads of department need to take the lead,
helping teams link back to the broader sense of purpose.

Shaping the Future final report 19

Shifts from phase 1 to phase 2
Across both phases of research the importance of employees
developing an emotional connection to their organisation’s
purpose, internalising it and practising it in their daily
routines is evident. In the second phase, the importance of
creating shared purpose in difficult times came more into
focus. People in the service sectors are generally passionate
about helping people in need and some of the organisations
are starting to integrate their purpose into objectives and
performance assessment. However, organisations need to be
aware that too much process around this can compromise
employees’ emotional connection with the purpose.

Relationships to other insights

Shared purpose is closely aligned to both leadership and
engagement. Leaders need to engender a strong sense of
shared purpose and when achieved this keeps employees
motivated and engaged by working towards the same
ultimate goal. A strong sense of shared purpose can
also ensure that various parts of the organisation stay in
alignment with a common aim.

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• Visible leadership and communication is a must in difficult times.
• Line managers need to take an active role in coaching and providing encouragement.
• Line managers can help with sense-making.
• Leaders need to empower others but set key principles and parameters to ensure greater
consistency of empowerment in organisations.
• Leaders need to develop a collaborative decision-making style.
• Leadership skills are needed at all levels.

Definition: Senior leaders articulate a future-oriented Visible leadership and communication is a

vision in an appropriate style that informs decision-making must in difficult times
and empowers employees to achieve organisational There has been an increased focus on leadership to
effectiveness. The ability to lead, however, is not confined drive organisations through difficult times. A number of
to senior leaders and can be demonstrated at all levels. our case studies were enhancing their leadership and
communication efforts and developing both greater
Leadership and sustainable organisation visibility of and accessibility to their leaders.
performance
Leadership is critical to sustainable organisation
performance. Throughout our case studies we identify the At Birmingham City Council, the senior management have
pivotal role of leadership in promoting change and agility. been increasing their visibility by running roadshows and
drop-in sessions across the city, which have been positively
In phase 1 we proposed the importance of distributed
received by middle and line managers.
leadership for sustainable performance. However, further
examination of this original proposition in phase 2 revealed ‘Physical visual presence has made a significant impact
that although leadership at all levels is certainly important, in terms of how EPM was eventually implemented and
style is also significant. how managers have actually taken that massive change
programme on board.’
Sustainable leadership is collaborative and connects people
to the organisation purpose and vision. There are situations
in the short-term where directive leadership may be
considered appropriate, but this style is not sustainable and Over the past year at Standard Chartered, employees said
they have noticed a step-change in communications with the
should not become a default setting. Leadership at all levels
CEO and other senior leaders using a much more personal
contributes to organisational sustainability, from employees
style, talking about their family and experiences outside of
taking responsibility for their own role and contribution
work as well as delivering formal messages.
at ground level, to senior leaders making sense of the
environment and communicating the vision for change. Employees and managers also spoke about the strength of
Through our case studies we have seen that the economic role models at senior levels within the bank.
backdrop is driving the leadership imperative to new levels,
especially in the public sector.

Shaping the Future final report 21

 At Pfizer (Grange Castle) there has been a focus on For employees at Pfizer (Grange Castle), having the freedom
leadership and communication in the last 12 months to to carry out their role depends on the confidence and ability
help employees through the many changes experienced. of their manager – and most were very positive about their
Communications have been continuous through a number immediate supervisor or manager, believing they were
of different channels, including quarterly ‘All Hands’ ‘encouraging and open to ideas’.
Updates, ‘Make Sure We Talk’ sessions, and a recent
Leadership Conference. Additionally, a ‘wall of change’ has ‘I certainly feel that with my supervisor I could say whatever I
been created as a visual and public way of communicating like and sometimes he will agree with it and say, yes, go for it,
changes and senior leaders routinely visit the wall and and some things he’ll go, like, no actually, I’d say the way we are
discuss issues once a week. doing it now is probably better. Either way I feel listened to.’

Senior managers have been focusing on developing a

coaching style and increasing their visibility across the Line managers can help with sense-making
business. The process for senior leader planned walks around Line managers play an important role in making sense of
the site has been improved. The 12 directors in pairs take it change communications for themselves and their teams.
in turn to visit different areas every week. They gather for an
initial 15 minutes at site boards to discuss areas for focus as
part of their walkabout. They then spend 45 minutes on the At Birmingham City Council, managers need to understand the
floor followed by a 15-minute action-oriented debrief. This change journey and what is required from both them and their
keeps the team in touch with all levels of the organisation teams. Cascading communications around the key messages
and the day-to-day issues that arise. about the changes and the council’s priorities to managers at
all levels is a challenge but, if successful, will enable sustainable
‘I think there has been more interaction with the site performance and unify the council. It will ensure that staff
leadership team. There was more visibility of them around.’ receive consistent messages about what is happening.

‘Certain directors were really good, really into it and

interested.’
Leaders need to empower others but set key
principles and parameters
Line managers need to take an active role in The need to empower and even ‘license’ employees to
coaching and providing encouragement act is critical in all of our case studies. So too is the need
Line managers have a crucial role in coaching employees to ensure that employees are acting both with a common
and providing them with guidance and feedback through purpose and towards their organisation’s wider objectives.
change. Such positive feedback helps provide employees The balancing act is therefore to empower people as much
with the motivation they need to keep performing through as possible but to ensure they act within a framework
periods of uncertainty and change. of agreed key principles and parameters. This tension is
illustrated in Figure 4.

At Standard Chartered, line managers provide regular

feedback and encouragement:
Figure 4: The tension between empowering
people yet setting clear parameters for action
‘For me one important thing is that we get regular feedback
from our manager and the business. So for example if we do
something that is not very good the manager will say “Okay Set clear
you should do it that way or do it better.” Similarly we get parameters
encouragement if we do a good job, from our manager as
well as from the business.’

Empowering people
at all levels

22 Shaping the Future final report

 Although discussion around leadership at Birmingham At Xerox, how accountable and empowered to use
City Council focused mainly on senior leaders and judgement people feel is dependent upon which part of the
the capability of other management layers to lead the business they operate in:
organisation, the value of empowering employees was
also mentioned. It is felt that people at all levels benefit ‘I think it depends which part of the business you sit in. Any
from ‘defining better the key principles and parameters of our client-facing people are the most empowered people
in which people work and leave it to…people to operate in the organisation. People can be frustrated by corporate
within those’. bureaucracy but empowered and able to put things in place
to improve the business.’
‘I think the front line have got to be empowered to do
their job at the end of the day, especially when you have ‘It goes back to the business improvement initiatives. We
got a lot of remote workers who don’t always necessarily need to give people accountability. Yes we drag people in
come into contact with the base location on a daily basis.’ the room to have the conversation but then we must give
them the space to do something with the outcome.’
‘I can see a turn towards more focused outcomes and
change in how we carry out our work. Agile working will ‘There is a clear desire to give accountability and ownership
increase output of work and freedom to carry out our to people. We are establishing enablers to operate, which is
work within timescales.’ a form of empowerment.’

‘We always recognise that full accountability is great and

we are engaged in the discussion around giving more
There is a need for greater consistency of flexibility to people to do the best in their job. There are
empowerment in organisations some particular organisational constraints which make it a
While greater empowerment within parameters is desirable challenge. Do not have all the enablers yet so managing it is
this needs to be consistent across organisations to make the a challenge.’
best of people’s ideas and avoid feelings of injustice.

Leaders need to develop a collaborative

The managers all agreed that leadership was an important decision-making style
issue for BIG but not one they had necessarily as yet got Collaborative leaders support sustainable performance.
right. In terms of distributed leadership they did not think However, when the going gets tough leaders can often
there was a uniform approach regarding the extent to default to a driven and directive leadership style which
which people were empowered to display leadership skills can erode agility. In periods of great flux and economic
or use their judgement. uncertainty, sometimes decisions need to be made quickly
and decisively, but this should only be for the short
‘There is no uniform approach. Some parts of the business
are risk-averse and controlling maybe for good reasons.
term and not a default setting for leaders. Reinforcing a
Others are much freer and empowering in approach.
collaborative problem-sharing approach can drive longer-
I think there is a recognition that staff are the most term, sustainable change, agility and engagement.
expensive but valuable asset. If we don’t encourage them
to use judgement we’re wasting money.’

‘There is a big difference between the operational side

and the regions and it’s absolutely evident that is down
to the leadership. You can see where people are trying to
follow suit on best practice but often some of the stifling
stuff is down to the culture where people won’t believe
that grade 2 can have good ideas.’

Shaping the Future final report 23

 The way in which senior leaders at Standard Chartered Shifts from phase 1 to phase 2
translate messages to staff is critical in communicating the There is a noticeable emphasis on developing a more
direction of the bank. collaborative style of leadership in phase 2. While in periods
of change sometimes decisions need to be more directive,
‘The CEO and the CFO share with us all the numbers and this should not become the default setting.
their strategy as well as issues they see for Hong Kong in the
coming six months or the coming year.’ Visible leadership and clear communications through
change are also critical and their importance was
‘That kind of engagement is really helpful in the sense that we
heightened in phase 2. Empowerment is desirable but
have a better idea of where the bank is heading in the next
within clear parameters that are aligned to organisational
couple of years. And also what sort of challenges banks and
objectives.
also finance are facing at the moment. I think that information
is really helpful to plan our strategies or intentions for the next
couple of years.’
Relationships to other insights
There is a clear relationship between the quality and
But the ‘how’ of executing the strategic direction and priorities is practices of leaders and engagement. Those organisations
discussed with staff in a collaborative way at different levels. This with visible and approachable senior leaders and line
helps in the translation of messages and to work as ‘One Bank’. managers that act as coaches and sense-makers for
employees have higher levels of engagement. Leaders also
play a key role in creating alignment within organisations,
Leadership skills are needed at all levels both through their strategy-making and communications
Finally, our case studies recognised that leadership skills are and shared purpose through their visioning.
not just the preserve of senior leaders but are needed at all
levels in successful organisations.

At BIG, the issue of the difference between leadership and

management was raised by a number of managers and
employees. Generally there is a feeling that managers do not
always make good leaders and while they may be successful
at managing process they are less successful in managing
people. However, there was also a feeling that the new
management system supports decision-making and use of
information in a more adequate way.

At Xerox, leadership skills at all levels of the organisation

were identified as another potential driver of performance.
In the GOD Service Delivery team generally, people feel
this has improved. There is a positive consensus on the
leadership capabilities of the general managers and people
generally feel there have been efforts to push accountability
further down the organisation to enable people to take
more control over their work and exercise judgement.
This appears to be manifesting itself in greater clarity over
how people are contributing to the business, and more
willingness to share knowledge and improve flexibility and
responsiveness.

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• Employees can be engaged with more than one locus at a time.
• Employees’ locus of engagement is not static.
• Employees’ locus of engagement may not translate to engagement with the
organisation.
• The line manager has a critical role, affecting engagement at different levels.
• Leader behaviour also affects employees’ engagement.
• Too much engagement with a particular locus can be a blocker to change.
• Perceptions of organisational injustice can be a performance blocker.
• The nature of engagement can be transactional or emotional.

Definition: People can be engaged at different levels and In Birmingham City Council, engagement with the service
with various aspects of the organisation or the work and user and to one’s immediate team is strong, with a typical
their engagement can be transactional or emotional in response from managers to the question about what you are
nature. engaged with being, ‘my staff and delivering services’.

Locus of engagement and sustainable ‘I think they are engaged with the service that they are providing
organisation performance to the service user and I guess to some extent they are also
Having engaged employees is important for the long-term engaged with their line manager… Whilst I am not sure that
they are necessarily engaged in the whole organisation if
performance of organisations as they are more likely to
you like, that is their focus and that is what they do.’
‘go the extra mile’ or put in extra effort. Much of the
work on engagement assumes that engagement is with Also, if people are ‘not exactly connected to an office or a
the employing organisation. However, in phase 1 of the unit because they spend all their time out in the community
research we found that employees can be engaged on and again I think that it is going to be service users and their
multiple levels: for example, with the organisation as a direct line manager.’
whole, with their line manager, with their team, their job
role or their profession. Each of these levels is an example
of a different locus of engagement. For sustainable
performance, it is important to understand how, and with At BIG some managers recognise that employees are engaged
what, employees are engaged. with different aspects of their organisation or their work.

‘There are some roles where naturally you would not get the
Employees can be engaged with more than same vocational engagement you would get in others.’
one locus at a time
Many employees appeared to be engaged on a number of ‘People are less engaged with how the organisation treats
levels at any one time. They might be engaged with their them in terms of development opportunities or pay. There
job role, the customer, their team or business unit, their own are also variations around how they feel engaged with
career or self-development and the organisation as a whole. their manager and the senior management team. There are
degrees to how people feel.’

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Employees’ locus of engagement is not static The line manager has a critical role, affecting
We also found that what employees engage with is unlikely engagement at different levels
to be static. Both the loci and the intensity of engagement One of the most important influences on engagement
are likely to differ over time, being influenced by a number demonstrated by our case studies is that of the line manager –
of internal and external factors. specifically, their behaviour, attitude and performance.

In Birmingham City Council managers felt that employees A number of employees from different case study organisations
develop a particularly strong emotional engagement with commented about how the line managers impacted on their
service users in times of uncertainty, especially when there own engagement levels and that of colleagues.
are questions over how the service might be provided in the
future. This is manifested in a strong desire to maintain the ‘People become disengaged when they are not supported to
quality of the care provided. carry out their role.’

‘Line managers do not always treat people fairly and are slow to
deal with poor performers, which can be very demotivating.’
‘BIG as an employer is right up there in terms of engagement.
However, some of the bureaucratic processes they have to
follow are down there, so yes people’s engagement will vary
At Pfizer the senior managers talked about how important
depending on their activity or what they are doing, but we
it is to ‘engage with people and get their ideas’. They place
had interesting results from our staff survey and generally
significant importance on the role of managers in engaging
they were pretty good and people were honest.’
and motivating teams.

What people are engaged with and the intensity of that

engagement can also be influenced by specific actions In any organisation there will be a small minority of people
taken within the organisation. who are disengaged and again the line manager has an
important role in trying to re-engage them.
Standard Chartered Bank encourages social events
because they improve engagement within the team. Large, In Standard Chartered, managers told us about how they
participative events such as town halls and charity events are actively working with the disengaged to understand
improve engagement with the organisation as a whole. the reasons why, and then talking it through and providing
support. They spoke about the value of having good-quality
one-to-one conversations with people and getting to the
Employees’ locus of engagement may root of the issues if they are disengaged. Managers also
not translate to engagement with the highlighted the importance of encouraging people to
organisation play to their strengths and exploring whether a person is
Individuals can exhibit high levels of engagement overall disengaged because their role is not suitable for them.
but low levels of engagement to the organisation. This
usually occurs where their locus of engagement is a work
team or business unit that is seen as somehow remote or Leader behaviour also affects employees’
even at odds with the wider organisation. engagement
Employees’ perceptions of organisational justice were also
For example, the iON employees within Xerox appeared linked to the behaviour of leaders. Employees were more likely
to be more engaged with the iON team and the customer to be engaged with the organisation and its purpose if they
than with Xerox itself. There was a strong sense of purpose felt their leaders were also engaged. Sometimes referred to as
and teamworking within the iON team and they felt slightly authentic leadership, people were more likely to believe and
removed from the wider business. trust what leaders said if they felt those leaders really believed
in what they were saying.

26 Shaping the Future final report

 A quote from one employee illustrates how their perceptions At NHS Dumfries and Galloway, reducing health inequalities
of leadership have affected their engagement. is an organisation priority and strongly embraced by staff.

‘Our engagement scores are okay but senior management ‘You’re looking at safe, effective, efficient, reliable service
should be capable of providing the leadership which is for patients and staff alike…making sure that it’s equitable
required and there is a feeling that they are not leading well across the organisation, and that we provide support for
or doing a good job. Senior management is very much at staff, equally for patients too.’
arm’s length.’

The nature of engagement can be

Too much engagement with a particular transactional or emotional
locus can be a blocker to change As well as having different loci of engagement, it appeared
Employees in our case studies recognised that engagement that engagement can be transactional or emotional in nature.
can act as an enabler or blocker of performance.
We define transactional engagement as being contractual in
We found instances where high engagement with a particular nature, with individuals fulfilling basic expectations in terms
team or work group, while driving performance in that area, of getting the job done and looking after the interests of the
acted as a potential blocker when looking for flexibility or organisation. They may be engaged because they believe this
agility throughout the organisation. is what the organisation expects and this is what they need
to do to stay in employment or be promoted to the next
level. However, they are not necessarily emotionally engaged
‘People are focused on giving good service and that makes
with the organisation or the work and hence will quickly
them suspicious of the motives behind cost-cutting.’ (Manager,
turn off their willingness to perform if they perceive that
Birmingham City Council)
they are unfairly rewarded for their efforts or if they identify
opportunities to pursue elsewhere.
Perceptions of organisational injustice can be a
performance blocker Emotional engagement is more deep-seated and occurs when
Within our case studies there were some instances where people really identify with their work and are motivated by
perceptions of unfairness acted as a blocker of performance. the desire to do a good job or do the right thing. As illustrated
Such perceptions of organisational injustice could negatively in previous examples, we found instances of high emotional
impact employees’ engagement with a range of loci. engagement in a number of our organisations.

For example, when line managers’ behaviour was People may be transactionally engaged with certain loci and
inconsistent across teams, employees perceived some emotionally engaged with others. In some instances it was
individuals as having greater access to career development apparent that employees were emotionally engaged with
or being given greater flexibility to exert their own the customer, but reported transactional engagement to the
judgement. While the engagement of those ‘lucky’ enough organisation. However, in other case study organisations it
to work for the ‘good’ managers might be enhanced, for was apparent that employees were emotionally engaged on
others this perception eroded their engagement. As well as numerous levels.
eroding engagement with the line manager, the resulting
perception of inequalities in the career development
offered across the organisation can also erode employees’
engagement with the organisation as a whole.

In addition, within all of our case studies we found that

employees were more likely to be engaged with their
employer if they believed customers were treated fairly
and ethically. There was evidence that employees were less
engaged with their employing organisation if they felt certain
customers were unfairly deprived of services.

Shaping the Future final report 27

 Relationships to other insights
NHS Dumfries and Galloway see the value of staff being
An integral part of engagement was the extent to which
emotionally engaged at all levels and managers talked about
organisations were able to engender a sense of shared
encouraging people to view their job role in the context of
the wider organisation.
purpose among their employees. Employees generally find it
easier to engage with a shared purpose when they are able
‘Well it took such a long time to get them over that to emotionally connect with it.
because I used to hear the same all the time “Oh I’m just a
cleaner.” “No you’re not; you’re a fundamental part of the We also found engagement to be linked to alignment. If
organisation. If you don’t do your job nobody else can do individuals could see and understand the extent to which
theirs.” And they kept moaning that they are not valued their roles and objectives fitted with organisational goals and
and I’m saying “But you don’t value yourself. Until you start how they contributed to the organisational purpose, they
believing you’re important and telling people, nobody else were more likely to develop a stronger sense of engagement.
will think you’re important.”’
Finally we noticed that it is important for managers to be
aware of what is important to employees and will motivate
Shifts from phase 1 to phase 2 them over both the short and long term. For example,
Across both phases of research we have noted that rewards and recognition may contribute to engagement in
employees can be engaged on a number of levels. This the short term, but career development, identification with
second phase of the research has revealed how important the organisation purpose and being part of an engaged
it is to understand how and with what employees are team may help drive engagement in the long term.
engaged as their loci of engagement can either enable or
block performance. Engagement with the customer was
particularly strong across all case study organisations and
we also found that employees’ relationship with their line
manager can affect their engagement with other aspects of
the organisation and their work.

28 Shaping the Future final report

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• Context affects how organisations assess their performance.
• It is important to strike the appropriate balance between collecting quantitative and
qualitative data.
• Too much, or the wrong emphasis on metrics, can impede productivity.
• Capturing and analysing information is the first step in assessing and evaluating
performance, but acting on the data collected is critical.
• Making data readily available to managers ensures more informed decision-making.
• Managers need to have the right skills to make sense of and interpret the data.
• As well as using data to evaluate past performance, it is important to draw insight from
it to inform future activity.

Definition: The processes that occur at different For Xerox the core objectives of returning value to the
organisational levels to gather qualitative and quantitative customer remain. However, changes in the external
information, to assess the impact of actions and inform environment mean that whereas last year the case study
decision-making. contract was dominated by demand issues, it is now
dominated by the challenge of demonstrating they are
Assessment and evaluation and sustainable delivering efficiency and cost savings.
organisation performance
For many organisations, including our case studies, ‘Everything’s cost related at the moment. If you can save
money, it doesn’t matter if it’s a pound or a thousand
assessment and evaluation is a less developed area but
pounds or hundreds of thousands of pounds, we’ve got to
one that is considered a high priority. Assessment and
show savings across the board.’
evaluation should be a continuous process, ensuring the
right measures are developed and quantitative findings ‘Objectives fall into two areas: retaining contract and
are evaluated alongside qualitative, contextual information returning value. Last year our service was demand-driven,
to provide organisational insights. Through constant now its demand-challenge. Last year the emphasis was
assessment and evaluation it is possible to provide efficiency in terms of delivering on the demand, now we
insights not only about past performance, but also to are about cost savings and looking at how we can deliver
‘take the temperature’ of the organisation at present. efficiency to achieve this.’
This information can be used to inform future direction,
therefore contributing to sustainable performance.
It is important to strike the appropriate
Context affects how organisations assess their balance between collecting quantitative and
performance qualitative data
The demands of the external context will affect the Collecting qualitative data can help to inform and explain
measures organisations pay most attention to. For example, quantitative data. Qualitative data can also provide a depth
the current external pressures to drive down costs are acting of information that can be used to evaluate and inform
as a stimulus for organisations to improve in this area. operations when it is not possible to quantify outcomes.

Shaping the Future final report 29

 BIG has adopted a balanced approach to assessment and
Capturing and analysing information is
evaluation that reflects their focus on allocating lottery
the first step in assessing and evaluating
money in a sustainable way. As well as focusing on
performance, but acting on the data collected
efficiency, their ‘Intelligent Funder’ programme reflects
is critical
the emphasis placed on effectiveness, sustainability and Interpreting the data collected and feeding it back into the
customer experience. business was a weaker area for many of the organisations.
Few are doing it effectively and it is viewed as a critical area
‘Two years ago our measures were all about the process for improvement.
of getting the money out of the door in a timely fashion.
Now it’s more balanced; some are about the processes we
operate but the high-level indicators are quality of customer NHS Dumfries and Galloway are also concentrating on
experience, the difference our money makes and the improving effectiveness in this area.
consequences of doing stuff.’
‘There are growing debates about some of the data we’re
using. People, historically, are not very good at using the
data, but I think over the last few months they’ve been asked
A manager at Birmingham City Council talked about the to look at data and improve it in terms of what data they
importance of providing qualitative commentary around actually require – to look at using it to drive their services.’
‘the figures’. For example, service delivery needs to be
balanced with information about the quality of services:
‘just because a service is “received” doesn’t mean it was
of good quality’. Xerox’s management information system has significantly
improved the flow of information, but there was still little
evidence about how this information is used. However,
managers are very positive about the work of the business
Too much, or the wrong emphasis on
intelligence team, who are improving processes and
metrics, can impede productivity
providing daily usage reports.
People can get frustrated if they cannot see the
information they record being used and fed back into the ‘First-line managers are trying to simplify the processes
organisation. Having too many measures can lead to a around storing information and making the process more
focus on quantity over quality. meaningful. It’s too early to say what the impact is but you
can already see people working closer together and making
the data more meaningful.’
There is a feeling by some that the metrics are sometimes
measuring quantity rather than quality and others HR is looking at how the performance data available to
suggested that objectives and targets should continually managers can be used more effectively.
be reviewed as workloads and circumstances change:
‘Xerox prides itself in doing the right things, such as
‘All about numbers and about getting things done in performance management, but now we have asked the HR
time, they are not necessarily about the quality of it.’ community to get closer to managers to do something with
the outcomes of these.’

Organisations need to balance stakeholder demands to ‘We have to make sure we make use of the performance
focus on certain measures. With organisations collecting data. Bring alive and make it a real and valid process rather
data for regulators, or within the public sector to compare than a pretty exercise once a year.’
against government targets, a challenge for organisations
is how to tie these performance measures with their own
internal metrics.

30 Shaping the Future final report

 Similarly, Birmingham City Council is undertaking a Managers at Birmingham City Council now have at their
significant piece of work around workforce metrics. The fingertips the information they need to manage their team
next stage of this work is concentrated on developing the and make informed decisions. However, it is up to the
mechanisms by which the wealth of information collected individual managers to use this information effectively and
is fed back into the organisation and informs workforce act on it. HR is providing support for managers to use the
planning and broader talent management activities. new processes.

‘We are well on the way to being a well-informed ‘The provision of better workforce information is equipping
organisation. The skill now is learning how to use that managers to more readily see where they are performing
information effectively.’ well and where issues are emerging that will see where
performance will drop.’
‘We can redirect workforce priorities and outcomes using
the process.’ ‘It essentially does give that framework for the everyday,
day-to-day management because obviously as a manager
Most importantly, workforce and financial information are you can log on and look at policies and procedures if you
being tied together through the business transformation need to do certain things or you can run reports in terms of
programme. One manager talked about how this will result your sickness, your staff sickness and so it gives you the tools
in an integrated business planning process, aligning different essentially to be able to manage on a day-to-day basis.’
parts of the council and setting out short-, medium- and
long-term aims.
Better provision of management information has implications
for resourcing and skills. The improved flow and use of
Making data readily available to managers information makes managers more accountable for what
ensures more informed decision-making they and their team do and also more informed about the
Our case study organisations were strong on ensuring skills and resources they need to do it. For this data to aid
managers had the information needed, in an accessible decision-making, new skills may be needed of managers.
and comprehensive format, to inform decision-making and
allocate resources.
At Xerox line managers are involved in ensuring
management information is used to inform decisions and
In Xerox, management information is now more readily used in the right way.
available and accessible across the business. Managers feel
they can draw on information when necessary, to inform ‘We have to make sure we make use of the performance
decisions and allocate resources. data. Bring alive and make it a real and valid process.
First-line managers are trying to simplify the processes
‘Information is more available and accessible across the around storing information and making the process more
business and we are giving the people who use the meaningful… you can already see people working closer
information the ability to pull down and draw down together and making the data more meaningful.’
information as they need it. It’s providing people with the
information to evaluate their decision-making.’

‘The high-level use of data helps us to be consistent in what With greater data at their disposal, managers at Birmingham
we do.’ City Council are developing the new skills required in their
role to use this information.

‘As a manager it affected how I recorded and administered

employee information of a dispersed workforce.’

‘The change in how managers work has changed and more

managers are having to be skilled up on IT and multi-tasking.’

Shaping the Future final report 31

As well as using data to evaluate past The most significant finding within this theme is that
performance, it is important to draw insight although most of our case study organisations are
from it to inform future activity collecting data to evaluate performance and key initiatives,
Organisations need to use the data they collect to inform few are actually using this knowledge pool to generate
future operations and to scenario-plan, enabling them to insights that can inform future activity. This tension is
be more agile. Our case study organisations talked about illustrated in Figure 5.
the importance of taking the time to reflect on learning
at the end of a programme of work, drawing insight from
experiences, and highlighted the danger of people getting Figure 5: The tension between collecting data to
demonstrate past performance and drawing insight
‘carried away by the next new thing’ and not taking the
to inform future direction
time to reflect and share the learning from the last activity.
Drawing insight
At Pfizer, employees and managers had set up informal from data to inform
contacts with people in other teams to share learning. future direction
Through conversations with people in other parts of the
business who had undertaken a similar project in the past,
new projects could benefit from hindsight. Employees felt that
formal processes needed to be put in place to ensure that this
Data collection to
beneficial sharing of learning occurred across the business.
demonstrate past
performance
Through their ‘Intelligent Funder’ programme of work,
BIG Lottery employees feel more is being done to use the
learning from past work to inform current programmes. Shifts from phase 1 to phase 2
Assessment and evaluation was a less developed area
‘The new programme forum gives greater opportunity for for most of our case study organisations in phase 1,
evaluation and the lessons learned programme helps us to despite a strong recognition of its importance and
share learning and understand impact.’ contribution to sustainable performance. In phase 2, we
can see more focused efforts to collect assessment and
As part of the ‘Intelligent Funder’ programme, both
evaluation data. This is partly in response to feedback
managers and employees at BIG Lottery were involved in
from actions suggested in the first phase of research
a knowledge-sharing initiative called ‘evidence gathering
and partly in response to increasing financial pressures
groups’ (EGGs) to promote discussions around the impact
and constraints. Indeed, financial pressures mean that
of funding. Managers commented this is helping to ensure
organisations are in danger of developing too many
people are actively seeking information and promoting a
measures, which will impede productivity and agility in the
more inquisitive culture.
long run. Despite collecting greater data, most of our case
‘The EGGs have encouraged active participation in discussion study organisations are still struggling with developing
about outcomes and the impact of funding and bring people meaningful insights from the data that could shape current
together in an intelligent way of learning. It helps us develop and future organisation strategy.
better targeted programmes and have conversations with
government because we can talk the language of impact Relationship with other insights
rather than the language of delivery.’ The assessment and evaluation of an organisation’s
different activities and processes will help to provide
BIG have also developed their own internal version of
an overall sense of alignment through having cascaded
Wikipedia to encourage knowledge-sharing and capture
measures. Different assessment and evaluation measures
learning from past experiences.
will also be linked to both the short- and long-term
‘It’s starting to gather momentum and you can dive in and horizons. In addition, leadership needs to be interlinked
out. People are using it as an information exchange and to with assessment and evaluation because leadership strategy
address issues more quickly than before.’ and approach must be supported by meaningful data and
its interpretation.

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• Context determines the length of the ‘short’ and ‘long term’.
• Organisations must anticipate and plan for future external and internal changes.
• They (organisations) also need to be comfortable with uncertainty.
• The ongoing communication of the organisation’s vision and aims is important.
• Sometimes the short term has to take priority, but short-term pressures can act as
derailers.

Definition: Active awareness, management and NHS Dumfries and Galloway are very mindful of issues
communication of both known and unknown organisational relating to the ageing population and the impact this will
issues and pressures affecting the short term (of less than a have on their own workforce and demand for services. They
one-year timeframe) while maintaining an active focus on are actively accounting for this in their workforce planning:
longer-term priorities (with longer than a one-year timeframe).
‘There are continuing challenges around the workforce and
The short and long term and sustainable the demography of our region and therefore the impact
organisation performance that has on workforce availability, learning, development,
The importance of balancing the short and long term is attracting and retaining individuals and there are certain
a recurrent theme in our research and something that is areas within the organisation where at any given time those
heightened by the uncertain economic backdrop. In order issues are more or less acute and in the medical workforce
always features very highly as a tactical challenge at any
to be successful and sustainable, organisations need to be
given point in time.’
flexible in responding to the short-term imperatives of change
while keeping sight of the long-term horizon.

Context determines the length of the ‘short’ Standard Chartered Bank in Hong Kong had to anticipate
and ‘long’ term the fallout from the global banking financial crisis and the
Clearly, different organisations have varying timeframes that current return to growth and war for talent in the market:
they plan and work to and this will be dependent on factors
specific to their context. While corporate visions/missions may ‘Banks and the financial sector have been identified as one
take a longer-term view, in practice it is not that easy to plan of the sectors that obviously caused the downswing and a
lot of pain for a lot of people. So obviously we are not the
extensively into the future. CIPD workforce planning research,
most popular of sectors at the moment. So what we’ve tried
for example, finds that only 25% of strategic workforce plans
to do is to emphasise that actually banks are there to serve
look three years or more in advance. What organisations can
communities and to be a trusted partner of the community.’
do, however, is proactively scan for future trends that will
impact the way they deliver their services or products. ‘We have been focusing on ongoing engagement to ensure
that people stay with us and that our performance is
Organisations must anticipate and plan for sustainable.’
future external and internal changes
Case study organisations were strong on scanning for future
external and internal issues that would impact or shape their And, in some cases they changed their business models to
agendas. ensure they are well positioned for the long term.

Shaping the Future final report 33

 At Xerox, the acquisition of ACS was shifting horizons to a Outlook research (summer 2010) suggests, people can
long-term focus because that was the nature of services. accept tough decisions if they are kept informed and given
the right information at the right time.
‘I think we do have a good balance. Although we have the
classic American organisational requirement to report results The ongoing communication of the
quarterly, we now have a much more long-term focus. organisation’s vision and aims is important
The shift to services has emphasised the long term and Despite possible uncertainties, the ongoing communication
relationship-building.’ of the organisation’s vision and aims will help to provide
focus for organisations and employees at all levels. The case
For our public sector organisations, the Government’s studies showed the importance of keeping this alive and
spending review and resulting efficiency savings is fresh for people and the importance of keeping both short-
understandably uppermost in their minds. The challenge and long-term horizons uppermost in their minds.
here is to understand that the necessary cuts need to be
made without losing sight of the long-term vision, while
Generally both managers and employees agreed that BIG
also recognising the need to ensure the consistent delivery
has been successful at balancing short-term operational
of day-to-day services.
requirements with long-term strategy. Most attributed this
to the development of a robust strategy, which had enabled
They (organisations) also need to be
them to keep sight of their strategic objectives in the face of
comfortable with uncertainty
political and economic turmoil.
A key theme arising across all our case studies was the
need to be comfortable with uncertainty. Although a ‘It’s crucial to have a long-term sense of what we are about.
proactive stance needs to be taken in scanning future We have to be clear about our priorities and strengths and
issues, in a period of economic uncertainty or the early hold on to them, whatever is thrown at us. This makes us
days of a merger, senior managers have to accept that less susceptible to being diverted.’
some things are simply out of their control: ‘because you
haven’t got a sense of the long term really.’ This tension is
illustrated in Figure 6.
Employees at Standard Chartered talked about the many
methods of communication top leaders use to ensure
Figure 6: The tension between proactively scanning everyone in the bank receives the right messages at the right
for future issues and being comfortable with time. People talked about the effectiveness of town halls,
uncertainty
large-scale dial-in calls and more informal, personal visits
from senior leaders to different business units.
Comfort with
‘Because we need to know what the challenges of the bank
uncertainty next year are also, right? So how can we explain what we
are doing in the countries or what we are doing day to day
to give support? You know delivering of the overall bank
strategy is also key as well. Communication needs to be
transparent and also needs to be honest.’
Proactive scanning
for future issues
Clearly articulating and communicating a future-focused
vision therefore helps people to balance the long and short
The need was not only for leaders to be comfortable term for themselves. Employees at all levels had a clear
with uncertainty but for them to coach others within the sense of the importance of, and were taking accountability
organisation to also be comfortable and to maintain good for, balancing the short- and long-term issues and
performance standards throughout – no mean feat. The challenges that they were facing. This seemed much more
importance of honest and open communications through pronounced than in the first phase of the research.
change cannot be underestimated. As the CIPD’s Employee

34 Shaping the Future final report

 This meant that they were not only prevented from
In Birmingham City Council within the Adults and
thinking about work-related long-term issues, but had little
Communities Directorate, the organisation vision is being
time or space to consider their own future careers with the
communicated to employees and this methodology is starting
to gain some traction. A key priority is ‘setting out the
organisation.
vision for the services, making it very clear what the vision
is and how people fit within that vision, what the roles and
‘Work pressures mean that I never get the chance to think
responsibilities are’. More communication around having a
about my career or the long term.’
long-term vision was a suggested action point from phase 1
of the Shaping the Future work. The directorate management
team is issuing a core brief to all employees about the
challenges the council is currently facing and its long-term A challenge articulated mostly by employees themselves was,
vision. As mentioned above, line managers feel front-line ‘how sustainable is this stretching of people and workloads?’
staff are looking to them to translate the corporate messages It might be manageable for the short term, but what impact
in terms of what they mean for individual job roles. will this have in the longer term on quality of outputs,
health/well-being and the work–life balance of employees?

Sometimes the short term has to take priority ‘At the end of the day you have to meet your targets and
A number of the case study organisations were coming
you have to get the job done, however you do it. This… can
under increasing pressure to respond to short-term only be sustained for so long.’
demands. These pressures related to a number of things,
including spending cuts, contractual arrangements and
increased regulatory scrutiny. Shifts from phase 1 to phase 2
In phase 2, there seems to be a greater emphasis on the
urgency of balancing the short- and long-term horizons.
At Pfizer (Grange Castle) the immediacy of taking part in a
More people at every level of each organisation are aware
comprehensive audit had to take priority in the short term.
of the issues and there seems to be greater accountability.
‘It depends on what is in the short term. The most recent The short-term pressures are also more severe than in
example is we have had an inspection, a direct inspection, we phase 1, particularly for people in service delivery, with
had to deal with responses very quickly and that was the priority the rapid rate of external changes that organisations
and that was the one thing that had to happen. If it is strategic, have to anticipate and respond to. There is also a much
it is there for a reason and if it is immediate, we will know that it greater need to be comfortable with, and maintain good
is an end game that it has to happen in the order of things.’ performance through, uncertainty. Challenging times
make latent tensions between short- and long-term issues
clearer. There is, therefore, a requirement for consistent and
But short-term pressures can act as derailers transparent communication processes to ensure both are
There was a general sense that fewer resources and held in constructive tension.
increasing workloads meant that many employees,
particularly those at the coal face, were finding it difficult Relationships to other insights
to keep sight of the long term: A strong interplay appears to exist between alignment,
short and long term, and assessment and evaluation. The
relationship between alignment and balancing the short
‘There is so much going on and so much change happening and long term is clear – organisations need to ensure that
all at once that I think sometimes it is difficult to take the time
they create and execute appropriate short- and long-term
to look up and see what the long-term issues might be and
objectives and that these are clearly understood by all.
how what you are doing now will actually shape how things
For assessment and evaluation, balancing the short and
are in the future.’
long term presents some challenges. Organisations need
‘Transformation has altered my volume of work and my to create both short- and long-term goals for evaluation
work–life balance because we still have to meet the same and find ways of assessing comfort with uncertainty and
targets despite staff reductions.’ good performance through uncertainty. It is also important

Shaping the Future final report 35

for evaluation of the short term to be used to inform the
long-term direction and future decisions. Finally, keeping a
sharp focus on balancing the short and long term can help
organisations become more agile.

Emergent themes
Two additional themes emerged from phase 2 of the
research. These are agility and capability-building and are
defined below.

Agility
The ability to stay open to new directions and
be continually proactive, helping to assess the
limits or indeed risks of existing approaches and
ensuring that leaders and followers have an
agile and change-ready mindset to enable them
and ultimately the organisation to keep moving,
changing, adapting.

Capability-building
Equipping the people in the organisation with
the skills and knowledge they need to meet both
present and future challenges. It also involves
identifying existing necessary and potential
capabilities and ensuring they are accessible across
the organisation. Capability-building applies
not only to individuals, but also to teams and
organisations.

We did not specifically probe into these two areas as part

of our research data collection. But from the data analysis
we undertook following the second phase, it was clear
these were new and discrete themes beyond the initial six
we had identified. We have therefore added them as two
additional ‘emerging’ themes that contribute to sustainable
performance.

These two themes are discussed below. As they only

emerged from the second phase, we are unable to provide
any phase 1/phase 2 comparisons.

36 Shaping the Future final report

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• An appreciation of current organisational challenges enables an agile mindset.
• People at all levels need to be ‘change-ready’ in both good as well as challenging times if
lasting organisational agility is to be achieved.
• It is important to also consider an organisation’s history when embedding agility.
• A silo mentality between different parts of the organisation can undermine agility.
• Organisations need to balance the rigorous management of resources with organisational
agility.
• A focus on continuous improvement is good for the long term but you have to get the
balance right.

Definition: The ability to stay open to new directions

and be continually proactive, helping to assess the limits Managers in the Xerox GDO Service Delivery team espoused
the value of employees understanding the wider context in
or indeed risks of existing approaches and ensuring that
which the business operates in order to respond to customer
leaders and followers have an agile and change-ready
needs in an informed, agile way. Acknowledging the limits
mindset to keep moving, changing, adapting.
of existing ways of doing things and thinking of creative
solutions will enable the organisation to increase their focus
Agility and sustainable organisation
on delivering efficiency and cost savings for their customer.
performance
The need for agility was emphasised across all of our ‘Local employees need to understand that we are shifting
six case study organisations as essential for long-term into a different world. The business is up and running and
performance, especially given the challenging set of now we need to prove we can do things differently and
circumstances that organisations currently face. In most deliver the promised innovation and effectiveness for the
of our case study organisations, people at all levels were client. Document advisers work with the client to advise how
actively encouraged to develop a change-ready mindset they might be able to save money. They also need to shift
and look for ways to improve how work is done. their attention to different mediums and channels – move
away from paper to other forms of documentation.’
An appreciation of current organisational
challenges enables an agile mindset
All of our case study organisations have prioritised People at all levels need to be ‘change-ready’
communication between senior leaders and employees in both good as well as challenging times if
about the current organisational pressures and the lasting organisational agility is to be achieved
need for change. Promoting this understanding among It is important to ensure that both leaders and employees
the workforce as a whole is seen as the first step in have an agile and change-ready mindset if the organisation
encouraging employees to ‘buy in’ to the necessary is to take advantage of new opportunities and proactively
changes facing the organisation. Line managers play a key adapt to changing circumstances and external challenges,
role in translating the formal messages for staff in terms of rather than simply react.
what is required of them as a team and in their individual
job roles. As such, managers can start to encourage an
open and agile mindset, at a particular point in time.

Shaping the Future final report 37

 Pfizer (Grange Castle) have introduced rhythm wheel tools
A silo mentality between different parts of the
to help with planning and combating volatility in work
organisation can undermine agility
A suggested action point for most of our case study
schedules (for example peak and troughs). These tools have
been developed using employees’ knowledge of the day-
organisations after phase 1 of the research was to promote
to-day role. However, along with the greater consistency cross-functional working. This helps to ensure that all parts
that comes through fairly prescribed role cards, comes the of the organisation are working together as one and are
challenge of ensuring variety and autonomy. aligned to the overall goals and vision. It can also increase
efficiency through sharing knowledge and learning, which
Pfizer are working to balance having a consistent workload with can help inform individuals of the limitations of current
the need for agility. They have firmly embedded continuous approaches and hence provide an evidence base for
improvement processes into ‘business as usual’, with employees initiating change.
now taking more ownership of them. Along with training in
continuous improvement processes, there has been training in
mindset and behaviours for all supervisors and managers. At Standard Chartered, managers and employees alike
discussed the importance of establishing a network of
contacts across the bank to be able to respond to customer
needs in an agile way and to adapt to new products and
But it is important to also consider an new regulatory requirements.
organisation’s history when embedding agility
If an organisation is not accustomed to change, its history ‘You have a lot of product partners so people have
may act as a blocker to agility. For example, employees may already got used to working with different people and
not be used to challenging the status quo. All parts of an understanding where they are coming from to bring a
organisation need to be change-ready and support each solution to the client.’
other for true agility.

Organisations need to balance the

In phase 1 of the research, Birmingham City Council was
rigorous management of resources with
at the beginning of a large-scale business transformation
organisational agility
programme. Managers felt that employees were reluctant
Organisations need to balance the tension between the
to believe change would actually happen, as change within
rigorous management of resources required in testing times
the council traditionally happened at a slow pace, with some
with the organisational agility to keep moving, changing,
change programmes not coming into fruition. However,
adapting (see Figure 7). With fewer resources available, our
business transformation happened at what people described
case study organisations were embracing the need to be
as an uncharacteristically fast pace.
more innovative and creative to do more with less.
In phase 2, communications from senior leaders have
helped staff to embrace change such as through formal
communication channels and roadshows. External drivers Figure 7: The tension between rigorously managing
have accelerated the pace of change and managers talked resources yet maintaining organisational agility
of the importance of helping employees to understand
how the public sector cuts and changes to the way services Rigorous
will be delivered will affect how the council operates and
management of
ultimately individual job roles. One manager commented on
the need to ‘get people to re-evaluate and understand that
resources
some things won’t continue to be done in the done way’. It
is important for employees to embrace the changes and for
front-line staff to be empowered for the council to be agile.
Organisational
agility

38 Shaping the Future final report

 BIG is adopting an intelligent funding (IF) approach to Overall, at Pfizer (Grange Castle) most interviewees
the allocation of lottery funds to cement its focus on the recognised that the embedding of continuous improvement
outcomes of funding. This involves assessing the value that processes in the business was helping the organisation to
the funding brings to communities and people in need, as meet both short- and long-term needs. Improving efficiency
opposed to the organisations that receive the funding. and performance would help both the site and the wider
organisation to remain competitive and sustainable for
For the intelligent funding approach to become truly the long term. However, some employees felt that the
embedded, BIG needed to simplify the way it does balance needs to be right between continuous improvement
business and also ensure that the two distinct parts of the and ensuring there are enough resources to respond to
organisation, the teams involved in intelligence-gathering increasing workloads over time:
and outreach work and the grant allocation teams, work
more collaboratively. ‘Now I think it will come to a stage where we have to beg
the question, are we going too lean?’
In phase 1 there was a degree of concern that the tendency
of people to work in silos, focused only on their own
projects or areas of work, was detracting from the ability of
intelligent funding to have an impact. However, in phase 2
Relationships to other insights
There needs to be a strong interplay between agility and
we found many more instances of knowledge-sharing and
assessment and evaluation if an organisation is to make
new initiatives to capture learning. BIG is continuing to work
on streamlining processes yet recognising that if they are too
informed responses to both short- and long-term pressures.
prescriptive, they may impede agility. In addition, agility is closely linked to capability-building as
people need to have the capabilities required to respond to
new challenges and opportunities presented by a change
in focus or direction. It is important that what employees
A focus on continuous improvement is good
are engaged with does not impede change and hence stifle
for the long term but you have to get the
agility. In sum, there is a fine balance between ensuring
balance right
that aspects of an organisation are aligned and having an
Most of the case study organisations were focused on cost
agile mindset to enable the organisation to keep changing
improvements, efficiencies and continuous improvement.
and adapting when appropriate.
Striving for continuous improvement was recognised
as helping organisations to meet short- and long-term
objectives, but this needed to be balanced with having
the agility to change path if circumstances, objectives or
resources altered.

Figure 8: Balancing a focus on continuous

improvement with organisational agility

Organisational
agility

Continuous
improvement

Shaping the Future final report 39

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• Capability-building needs to be a continuous process.

• Building capability is an integral part of successful organisational development and change
programmes.
• Management capability is essential.
• Different manager capabilities are required in difficult times.
• Organisations need to be creative about how they build staff capability in testing times.

Definition: Equipping the people in the organisation with Maintaining a focus on ongoing capability-building is
the skills and knowledge they need to meet both present especially important in times of fast change.
and future challenges. However, capability-building applies
not only to individuals, but also to teams and organisations.
In Birmingham City Council, managers’ roles are changing
It involves identifying existing and future required
through the organisational restructure and because the way
capabilities and ensuring they are in place or accessible
services are provided by the council is changing.
across the organisation.
‘It’s about making sure managers understand what they
Capability-building and sustainable need to do on that change journey.’
organisation performance
It is important to regularly assess the skills of employees In addition, with new people management systems and
to ensure they are suitable for the needs of the team processes, managers were keen to ensure they have the skills
and ultimately the organisation. To enable sustainable required for their new roles.
organisation performance, organisations need to ensure ‘As a manager it [introduction of a new system] affected
they are embracing the capabilities needed for today, but how I recorded and administered employee information of a
also those for future success. dispersed workforce.’

Capability-building needs to be a continuous

process
Across our case study organisations, managers talked about At Standard Chartered, quite a few managers commented
the need to embed development and skills training as on the need for people to have the right skills and
part of business as usual, rather than as a one-off activity. knowledge required by the bank in the long term and
that the continuous development of people is essential for
sustainability.
At Xerox, interviewees felt that growing the skill base of
staff should not be a one-off or reactive activity, but firmly ‘I think one thing we need to keep up to speed with is to
embedded in the organisation. keep learning and to learn new things. Because to me the
bank moves much quicker than before.’
‘There is an expectation now on everyone to leverage their
expertise into the account so they can grow it; bring new
skills to the party. There is an expectation that Xerox should
always be looking to innovate and develop new capabilities.’

40 Shaping the Future final report

Building capability is an integral part of
successful organisational development and At Birmingham City Council, line managers valued the
change programmes conversations they have with staff.
All of the case studies had embarked on a programme of ‘It is that regular dialogue and contact with staff members,
work designed to promote the long-term performance of making sure that people are appropriately trained and
the organisation. In doing so, they were all mindful of the developed.’
capabilities required of individuals and of the organisation
as a whole to deliver on them.
And different manager capabilities are
required in difficult times
For example, BIG put in place a funding development
Managers need to have the skills and attributes to operate
framework to develop the capabilities required of people
even in challenging times. During periods of change,
within its intelligent funder approach. It was described
managers have to deliver difficult messages to staff and
mostly in positive terms by both managers and employees as
people often look to their manager for emotional support.
was the Scottish initiative the ‘carnival of learning’. As one
As such, they are pivotal to the success or failure of change
manager commented:
programmes and thus building their capability in these
‘Two weeks of quite intensive training to get people ready areas is critical.
to launch a new programme. It was trying to get people to
think about the kind of things that would enable them to
As a result of the first phase of research, one area that Pfizer
impact as intelligent funders. I found it a positive initiative
concentrated on was developing managers’ understanding
and although we have not evaluated it yet it looks likely
of the emotional side of managing change. On the whole,
some people found the softer stuff more challenging than
within phase 2, interviewees felt there was a noticeable
the technical stuff which they are used to doing.’
improvement and that they are receiving this support.

Management capability is essential Maintaining engagement in testing times is a further

Interviewees in all of our case studies stressed that ensuring challenge for managers. In phase 1 of the research we
managers have both the people management and the right found that it is essential for managers themselves to be
technical skills are crucial for performance. In some of our engaged before they can effectively engage their team.
case studies, employees, and even managers themselves, In difficult times managers are expected to maintain
said there were inconsistencies in managers’ behaviours employee engagement, even when there may be a cloud of
and actions, for example, with some being good at uncertainty around their own jobs.
managing process but not at managing people.
In all of our case study organisations, managers talked
about financial rewards being constrained so it was
The attributes that define good line manager capability are important that they found alternative ways to give
articulated well in a comment from a Pfizer focus group
meaningful praise to show employees they are valued.
participant.
Also they have to have the capability to deal with poor
‘Someone who listens to your problems; it doesn’t mean performance.
they have to solve them or be capable of solving them, but
the fact that they are there to listen to you.’ Organisations need to be creative about how
they build staff capability in testing times
Even when budgets are tight, it is essential that staff
Managers are in the prime position to recognise skills gaps get the development they need to ensure they have the
within their team and address them. capabilities for their current job role as well as starting to
build those the organisation will need in the future. An
action that arose from phase 1 for most of our case studies
was around developing knowledge-sharing, enabling
people to learn from others across the organisation.

Shaping the Future final report 41

 At Xerox, teams identify people across the organisation who
Relationships to other insights
Capability-building is an essential factor in developing
possess the capabilities they need, and leverage them for
certain projects.
organisational agility and resilience. People need to have
the capabilities required to respond to new challenges
‘It was a tough project within a reasonably tight timescale, and opportunities. This insight is also closely linked to the
but by utilising experience and knowledge across the leadership insight, with organisations needing to ensure
business, rather than just someone who’s focused in one they have the appropriate leadership development in place.
area who might not have the holistic view to what those For example, leaders need the capability to be able to adapt
problems are, we achieved it.’ their leadership styles where appropriate. In addition, it is
important for capability-building to be aligned with both
‘It’s not until we come together that you actually start to
the short- and long-term needs of the organisation.
really get to know those individuals, and then you can utilise
their other skills.’

42 Shaping the Future final report

 4
Shaping insights and
provocations

So what do the results of our research mean 2  It’s a fine balance between alignment and
for practice? flexibility
From the eight themes we presented in the previous Organisational alignment, between the values,
section, we have developed ten insights for HR practitioners behaviours and objectives of internal and external
and business leaders about what will really make the stakeholders, and with the organisation purpose, is
difference for the long-term performance of organisations. critical. But, too strong or rigid alignment can block
Some of the insights relate directly to a theme, whereas performance, overemphasise short-term needs and
others span across themes. For each insight we pose stifle agility. To prevent this, alignment must be
provocative questions, rooted in the evidence, intended balanced with flexibility to enable the organisation to
to drive action and prompt HR and business leaders to morph and change.
appraise how their organisation currently operates, assess
the sustainability of these existing approaches and drive
action where appropriate. Provocations
• Do you know how aligned your organisation really is?
1  The organisation change response needs to be • Has your level of alignment prevented you from
truly agile and enduring, not a knee-jerk reaction challenging the status quo or doing something
that quickly dissipates differently?
Sometimes when organisations need to change it’s easy • Could the level of alignment you aspire to in
to confuse a one-off reaction for proactive agility. If the your organisation inadvertently inhibit sustainable
organisation reverts back to its steady state when the performance?
pressure eases, it may be that the change-ready mindset
and skills of individuals, and the structures and systems
to deliver lasting ‘generative’ agility are missing. Together 3  Shared purpose can only be achieved by finding
these components enable organisations to be open to the human connection beyond profit or short-term
new directions, assess the limitations and risks of existing efficiency measures
approaches, and keep moving and adapting. Organisations can’t impose a sense of shared purpose
and manipulated top–down selling of a common purpose
creates cynicism and resistance. Shared purpose is not
Provocations just for charities or the public sector. By encouraging
• How are employees developing agile mindsets, employees to find their own meaning at work, they
including having the courage to challenge, being connect and create a true sense of what they are at
curious and collaborative? work to do, that’s beyond profits or short-term efficiency
• Are managers permissive or dismissive in letting measures and regardless of the sector they operate in.
employees take the reins of change?
• Since your last crisis, what has changed long term and
what are you really doing differently? Provocations
• Have you genuinely engaged with employees on your
shared purpose?
• Are you confident your employees would agree?
• Where is your evidence?

Shaping the Future final report 43

4  Collaborative leadership brings sustainability, 6A
 n over-focus on today’s needs is not true talent
so don’t default to directive and driven when the management; it’s talent tunnel vision
going gets tough A focus on organisation capability that neglects to
Collaborative leaders support sustainable performance. see that it’s built on individual-level capability is set up
In periods of great flux and economic uncertainty, to fail. Often organisations pay too little attention to
sometimes decisions need to be made quickly and identifying and developing the capabilities individuals
decisively but this should only be for the short term will need in the long term. This implies a leadership/
and not a default setting. Reinforcing a collaborative talent management capability gap with too much focus
problem-sharing approach can drive longer-term, on the operational needs of today rather than the
sustainable change, agility and engagement. organisational imperatives of tomorrow.

Provocations Provocations
• How well do you understand the real leadership style • Are short-term pressures impacting on, or even
of your organisation and the impact it has? driving, your talent-planning?
• Is your leadership style genuinely collaborative? If not, • Does your organisation have the capability to assess
for how long is a directive approach sustainable? what future technical skills and behaviours are
• Do your leaders have the capability to flex their needed?
leadership style? • Do those responsible for talent planning act on this
knowledge?

5 ‘Middle management’ have a valuable

transforming and translating role but are often 7 Truly understanding employees’ locus of
bypassed rather than refocused, reskilled and engagement can avoid the risk of over-attachment
leveraged and underperformance
At a time of job cuts and role scrutiny, the temptation Organisations need to get under the surface of
is to bypass or cut out middle managers who are employees’ engagement and better understand what
often perceived as performance blockers. Instead of locus (a particular aspect of work or the organisation)
focusing on delayering this middle tier of the workforce, individuals are engaged with. If people become too
organisations should look at smart rewiring to maximise connected to one thing, this can undermine sustainable
organisational capability. Suitably skilled and refocused performance and loyalty to the organisation.
middle managers play a key role as transformers and
translators. Their transforming role is in bringing In times of labour market insecurity, high engagement
change to life and as translators they facilitate two-way scores can mislead managers. Having a job may mean
communications between leaders and the front line. employees are temporarily engaged in the short term,
but the fixed-grin mask soon slips.

Provocations
• Do your leaders bypass the middle management in Provocations
times of change? • How meaningful is your measure of engagement?
• Do your middle managers have the capability to be • Have you got a handle on employees’ locus of
both transformers and translators? engagement? Are they engaged with their team, their
• Is your management development informed by a real customers, their line manager, their organisation or
understanding of the value-adding capacity of middle something else?
managers? • Don’t be seduced by statistics: do you pay attention
to the nuances when action planning?

44 Shaping the Future final report

8  Perceptions of unfairness undermine employee 10  Leaders don’t always know best about the long-
engagement term vision
Misaligned practices and inconsistencies, such as in In good times, organisations can get by through
management behaviour or career opportunities, can repeating short-term business cycles. In less certain
lead to perceptions of unfairness or organisational times and for truly sustainable performance, long-term
injustice. This negatively impacts on employee vision needs to be more than this. Employees can be
engagement and is a blocker to performance. In tough the early warning system – in other words, they can
economic times these perceptions of injustice are rife. be the early detectors of threats and opportunities.
Effective mechanisms for upwards communications –
that filter the important signals from the ground from
Provocations the background noise – can reap dividends and inform
• Do people in your organisation feel they are being longer-term planning.
treated unfairly?
• As a result, do you understand who, or what, in the
organisation they feel disengaged from? Provocations
• Are such perceptions of organisational injustice • Is vision-scanning and -setting a two-way process or
founded on misalignment or inconsistencies, or is it a management monologue in your organisation?
just organisational grumbling? • Do you capture the views of employees about long-
term vision?
• Should middle management be empowered to
9  Process-heavy organisations are often still facilitate this?
insight-light
When organisations are saturated with data, why
don’t insights emerge? Is it the wrong data? Is it a
lack of time, capability and/or confidence to challenge
upwards?

For optimal impact, organisations need to constantly

review and cull data collection processes that don’t
add value. An overemphasis on backward-looking
targets defends existence but doesn’t prove worth.
Rather, organisations need to use the data, make the
connections and be curious to uncover real insight.

Provocations
• Are you collecting data for the sake of it? When was
the last time you challenged/removed a data process
that was not delivering?
• What is the missing link to move from data to insight?
• Are you really looking forward or just measuring the
past?

Shaping the Future final report 45

Appendices

• Appendix 1: Methodology 47
• Appendix 2: Case study summaries 49
• Appendix 3: Further sources of information 69
• Appendix 4: References 73

46 Shaping the Future final report

Appendix 1:
Methodology

Methodology study organisations, having regular discussions with our

A robust methodology is critical to the Shaping the Future main contacts to keep abreast of their progress on their
project. We have big questions to answer and we need to change journeys. We also used this dialogue to keep up to
do so within a rigorous framework that is both simple and date with the challenges and opportunities faced by the
accessible. organisations, brought into sharp focus by the economic
crisis that unravelled during this time.
Research design
Shaping the Future is a longitudinal action research We provided tailored feedback to each of our case studies
programme. We conducted semi-structured interviews and with suggestions for action, based on our observations
held focus groups with a sample of respondents from a during phase 1 of the research, aimed at helping them on
particular area of each case study organisation (see Table 2 their journeys.
on page 9) at two different points in time. A longitudinal
approach enables us to compare the findings from the two Phase 2 of the research was conducted between June and
phases of data collection. October 2010 and was designed to examine in more detail
the six themes that phase 1 had indicated were important
A literature review of the drivers of sustainable for long-term performance. We looked for evidence that
organisation performance revealed three main areas: supported or contradicted our assertions, as well as for
leadership, engagement and organisation development. further, emergent themes.
These three areas guided phase 1 of the research, which
was conducted between June and October 2009 (Figure 9). The case studies
Six case study organisations from the public and private sectors
Our phase 1 data suggested six key themes were took part in the research: BIG Lottery Fund, Birmingham City
important for long-term performance: alignment; shared Council, Pfizer (Grange Castle), NHS Dumfries and Galloway,
purpose; distributed leadership; locus of engagement; Standard Chartered and Xerox. These organisations were
assessment and evaluation; and balancing short- and long- selected for study as they are implementing specific change
term horizons. programmes (which aim to result in continuous change) to
drive long-term performance. Working with them, we are
In the intervening 12 months between phases 1 and 2 examining the drivers of sustainable organisation performance,
of the research, we continued to work with our case within the context of their change programme.

Figure 9: A longitudinal, action research design

Phase 1 Phase 2
June – October Action phase June – October
2009 2010

Shaping the Future final report 47

We examine the case studies as complex, adaptive systems Data analysis
(Ford 2008), learning from experience, improvising and Qualitative data were analysed using content analysis
responding innovatively to both internal and external (Mayring 2000) to uncover the dominant themes associated
pressures. It is important to take both the internal and with sustainable organisational performance. The data
external context into account to appreciate the real were examined in their entirety to uncover dominant
business environment (Dammanpour and Gopalakrishnan trends and coded according to our six themes from phase
1998). Dopson et al (2008) say that many studies 1 of the research. All data referring to a particular theme
acknowledge the role of context in change but for this were coded according to whether they supported or
research it is a particularly important variable of study. The contradicted its importance for sustainability. Further codes
context of each of our case studies is explained in the case were developed for additional, emergent themes. Labels
study summaries in Appendix 2. were then attached to the themes that emerged.

Data collection methods Multiple researchers were involved in both data collection and
In both phases of the research we conducted semi- analysis, to bring different perspectives and therefore build
structured interviews and held focus groups with a confidence in the findings. In addition, researchers outside of
cross-section of employees at different levels of our case the team acted as challenging ‘devil’s advocates’, probing key
study organisations. Interviewing people at different levels assumptions, insights and findings (Eisenhardt 1989).
and from different functions enabled us to gain multiple
perspectives on issues. Where possible and appropriate, The data were also analysed separately for each case study
we interviewed the same individuals as we interviewed in organisation, facilitating individual feedback into each
phase 1. organisation’s change process. We were able to draw
learning from each individual organisation (Appendix 2).
Despite the main criticism of self-report data collection
methods being that the information collected is difficult Grounding the research in practice
to verify, self-report is a key way of researching employee Although much has been written about the importance of
attitudes and perceptions (Yin 1990). Dibella (2007) sustaining performance over time (for example Buytendijk
recounts prior literature that states the importance of 2006, Collins and Porras 2005, Funk 2003), the issue that
studying a change programme from the perspective of remains is how this can be achieved. This is what Pfeffer
those involved with its implementation, in order to provide and Sutton (2000) term a knowing–doing gap, which
practical insights into the area of study. we aimed to address through Shaping the Future, driving
practice through our research knowledge.
We spent time within each case study organisation and
kept a journal to note our thoughts and observations, Shaping the Future has a strong engagement dimension.
especially during the action phase, to deepen our To date, nearly 11,000 practitioners have signed up to our
understanding of context and themes. Simultaneously dedicated network to take part and debate our findings
collecting and analysing data enabled us to ‘take advantage through online polls, discussions and invitations to round-
of emergent themes and unique case features’ (Eisenhardt table events on specific themes from the project.
1989) and allowed consideration of alternate explanations
of our findings. These events help to drive practice through sharing
learning. We have also run two focus groups on
Having a team of four researchers, we took steps to organisational culture and shared purpose, and on
maximise inter-interviewer reliability by ensuring a standard sustainable leadership. Other events held to drive practice
list of questions was used in the semi-structured interviews, include a large number of presentations, inputs to
ensuring that two researchers were present at interviews conferences and dedicated workshops. The increasingly
and that all interviews were recorded and transcribed. international dimension of the CIPD’s work means that we
benefitted from interchange with practitioners in areas as
diverse as Ireland, Romania, Turkey, Dubai and Hong Kong.

48 Shaping the Future final report

Appendix 2:
Case study summaries
Our research journey
• BIG Lottery Fund The first phase of data collection was carried out with the
• Birmingham City Council Big Lottery Fund between February and September 2009
• NHS Dumfries and Galloway and the second during July 2010. A series of meetings were
• Pfizer (Grange Castle) held with the key contact during the intervening action
• Standard Chartered phase to review progress on actions we had recommended
• Xerox from the phase 1 findings. We also discussed the impact
of developments in the wider environment, including the
change of government in May 2010 and the subsequent
The Big Lottery’s progress to intelligent public sector spending review.
funding
As well as focusing on the intelligent funder approach, the
The context research addresses the wider question of what enables and
The Big Lottery Fund (BIG) was established in 2004 gets in the way of sustainable organisation performance.
following a merger of the New Opportunities Fund and
the Communities Fund. BIG currently distributes around Phase 1: In search of sustainability
£600 million of lottery funds to projects connected to Our phase 1 research identified a number of themes that
health, education, environment and charitable purposes. appeared to have relevance to sustainable performance at BIG.

The organisation’s vision is to channel funding into areas that Organisational purpose
will bring real improvements to communities and the lives of Most BIG employees empathised with BIG’s purpose to
people most in need. It is an outcomes funder, which means improve lives and tackle disadvantage, although there were
that its main focus is on assessing the value that the funding a variety of views as to how this would be achieved.
brings to communities and people in need, as opposed to
the organisations that receive the funding. Understanding of intelligent funder concept
Managers generally understood the concept more clearly
The organisation is adopting an intelligent funding (IF) than others but all agreed it would put more emphasis on the
approach, which the chief executive describes as being evaluation of outcomes and have implications for job roles.
more of a guiding philosophy than a change programme.
There is a need to simplify the way BIG does business and People
also ensure that the two distinct parts of the organisation, The prevailing view was that BIG employs high-quality
the teams involved in intelligence-gathering and outreach people who are passionate about their work and get a
work and the grant allocation teams, work more sense of personal satisfaction from achieving BIG’s aims.
collaboratively. An intelligent funding approach will bring
about the leadership and cultural changes that have been Communication
identified as being key to sustained organisational success. Communication was viewed as very positive and enabled
people to feed their views upwards.
The intelligent funding philosophy was a key focus for the
research. During phase 1 of our research BIG were rolling Career progression and talent development
out the IF concept to their staff and communicating how These were viewed as potential enablers of performance.
this would impact on behaviour and roles. During phase 2 However, employees felt the development processes were
much of the communication and learning was in place, unclear and there needed to be more flexibility to enhance
but they were continuing to embed the intelligent funding cross-functional working and understanding, and more
philosophy within an environment of tight cost control and sharing of workloads.
rising demand for lottery funding.
Shaping the Future final report 49
Cross-functional working Phase 2: Our key findings
This was a key enabler that was being encouraged In phase 2 we collected data in three main areas. First,
by a number of HR initiatives, including development we looked at what had changed in the intervening 12
programmes and talent management. months in terms of strategic priorities and core purpose.
Second, we reviewed the potential drivers of sustainable
Research into action performance that had been identified in phase 1, both
Between phase 1 and phase 2 data collection we had those specific to BIG and those identified across all six case
regular meetings with our key contact. One of the study organisations. Finally, we looked once again at the
main issues facing BIG was the impending change of performance indicators and asked about the barriers and
government. In 2008 the Conservative manifesto raised enablers of both individual and organisational performance.
the question of the abolition of the Big Lottery Fund should
they form the next government. BIG’s corporate priorities Strategic priorities and core purpose
and new values demonstrate how there is a focus on using BIG’s strategic priorities have remained reasonably stable
its funding expertise, learning and knowledge – combined over the 12 months since phase 1. However, the issue of
with efficient and effective mechanisms for use of lottery cost control is now more important than before and is
money and a supportive and helpful customer service dominating the strategic agenda. Although most people still
approach. This involved engaging with a wide range of believe that the strategic priorities hinge around the three
public opinion stakeholders and getting feedback from cornerstones of efficiency, effectiveness and the quality of
customers. The result is that BIG has emerged strongly the customer experience, they also feel that the current
from the review of quangos and NDPBs, although all lottery climate is shifting the organisation towards the efficiency
funders have come under increased pressure to reduce priorities, potentially to the detriment of the other two.
costs as a percentage of the funding they distribute.
The intelligent funder concept seems to have been well
BIG used some of our phase 1 findings and suggested embedded across the organisation, with a wealth of
actions to inform their people management work. In evidence to suggest the majority of employees have
particular they enabled their funding programmes to be internalised the concept and refocused their actions and
more agile and to capture the learning from previous job roles accordingly. However, some think that there
programmes to feed into the planning process. They is a trade-off between efficiency and cost control and
also identified intelligent funding ambassadors to run intelligent funding, which needs to be carefully balanced.
workshops across the business to embed the IF concept
and bring it alive for all employees. Knowledge-sharing
In phase 2, it appears that knowledge-sharing has
Finally, another area of action has been around improved significantly with a number of initiatives in place,
management behaviour and skill – in particular, addressing some of the barriers to performance such as
repurposing the management role to create clear career the sharing of workloads and expertise. However, although
paths, develop consistency of management across the much more knowledge and learning is being captured,
business and enable managers to fulfil their potential as there is some cynicism around how effectively this is being
drivers of performance and engagement. A particular issue fed into new programmes. This has, however, happened
identified by the research data was the need to develop successfully in the Scottish region, where a ‘carnival of
managers to empower staff and enable them to act with a learning’ initiative was recently held, which enabled
greater degree of freedom within their defined roles. understanding of how the learning would be used.

Management development
The management development programme too has
addressed some of the management issues found in
phase 1 but has not resulted in a uniform approach.
Employees also identified a difference between
management and leadership, and while they are generally
more positive than in phase 1 about line managers, they
find the leadership overly bureaucratic and stifling initiative.

50 Shaping the Future final report

Engagement However, a number of other threats have increased in
Engagement is viewed as a positive driver of sustainable importance on BIG’s horizon, not least those related to the
performance and interviewees feel that BIG makes a economic environment. At the time of data collection BIG
concerted effort to understand and improve it. But were shedding staff, which inevitably has implications for
employees feel there are different levels of engagement in engagement and perceptions of leadership.
different areas of the business. They believe this is related to
a lack of understanding by managers of the different roles in
their areas of responsibility.

Leadership
Leadership is judged to be very important but few think
they have successfully developed the best leadership model.
Good management does not always translate into good
leadership because they are related to managing process
rather than managing people.

Organisation purpose
There is a strong sense of shared purpose at BIG with many
unsolicited comments about how positive people feel to
be working for an organisation that makes a difference to
the lives of disadvantaged individuals and communities.
It is clear that this feeds into a number of enablers of
performance such as role clarity, communication, and
respect and recognition for work carried out.

Enablers and threats to performance

The improvements in management information and
communication are considered to be an enabler as people
are able to understand how they are doing in relation to
key performance indicators (KPIs). They also consider that
greater flexibility and knowledge-sharing has significantly
enabled performance.

Internally the biggest threats to performance are

identified as an over-reliance on process, which tends
to stifle innovation, the ability of managers to recognise
performance effectively and the HR systems. Externally the
biggest threats are posed by the economic and political
environment.

What does the future look like?

BIG has made tangible efforts to address a number of
issues identified in our phase 1 work, with significant
improvements in many areas. The majority of the barriers
to performance identified in phase 1 have been mitigated
and phase 2 unearthed evidence that demonstrates
that knowledge-sharing and cross-functional working in
particular have positively impacted on performance. The
threat posed by poor management has been recognised
and is reported to be improving.

Shaping the Future final report 51

Birmingham City Council is raising its game Organisational purpose
with workforce management At all levels of the council there was a good understanding
of the organisational purpose and a desire to help the
The context organisation realise this purpose. One interviewee proposed
Birmingham City Council is the largest council in Europe, that, ‘when people can see how they fit into the whole
employing 60,000 people. In April 2006, they embarked on picture…they are generally more motivated.’
the largest business transformation programme in UK local
government – a programme that is set to revolutionise the Long-term vision
way the council delivers services to people who live, learn, There was general agreement from managers at all levels
work in or visit Birmingham. This large-scale programme of about what the council will look like in a few years’ time
work will enable the council to sustain its performance over as well as the factors that are prompting these changes.
the long term and the current external challenges make it There was also an understanding that the nature of
even more important. job roles, including those of managers, will change.
Interviewees talked positively about the consultations that
There are nine strands to the business transformation have been held and one manager said, ‘you can see lots of
programme. The research focuses on one of these: information around change and what will happen in the
excellence in people management. This strand of the future.’ Broader communication with the whole workforce
programme aims to transform the council into an authority was a challenge being addressed in phase 1.
where people at all levels are free to use their talent,
creativity, energy and commitment to serve the public Managers supporting employees through change
and improve services. Being responsible for delivering Line managers play a key role in both communicating
public services, the council is its people. A new workforce to employees about changes within the council and
scorecard and performance development review process is supporting them through those changes. One manager
being implemented that will make it possible to compare said, ‘it is about…getting them to understand that change
people performance across the authority as well as predict does not always have to be scary.’ Managers see their
future workforce trends. role as motivating staff through the difficult periods to
ensure a high standard of service continues to be delivered.
Our research journey However, they felt they would benefit from additional
The first phase of data collection was carried out with training about how to further support staff, especially those
Birmingham City Council between May and August who have worked for BCC for their whole career.
2009 and the second during June and July 2010. In the
intervening time period we met regularly with key contacts Line managers
to discuss the actions being taken as a result of the phase 1 Line managers’ roles in motivating and engaging staff were
findings and the challenges faced by the council, in reported to be a key enabler of performance. The employee
particular the economic pressures. survey results revealed that 94% of respondents felt their
immediate boss trusts them to get on with their job.
A key priority for the council is to raise its game in relation Reassuringly, 80% of people felt their immediate manager
to workforce management and we follow BCC on its is always or usually open and honest and treats them fairly
journey, exploring how this focus will drive sustainable and 84% of people said their line manager is supportive if
performance. In addition to exploring the impact of this they have a problem.
activity, the research addresses what enables and gets in
the way of sustainable organisation performance. Informal learning between managers
Managers reported the positive benefits of the informal
Phase 1: In search of sustainability networks they had established. One manager commented,
Our phase 1 research identified a number of themes that ‘you initiate your own meetings with your own peers…
appeared to have relevance to sustainable performance at sharing information and skills and learning from each
Birmingham City Council. other.’ It was felt that middle and line managers would
benefit from having the kind of networks that senior
managers have across directorates.

52 Shaping the Future final report

Metrics Discussions with our key contacts during this period centred
Interviewees made it very clear that having the right metrics around how, with the decreased resources and the need
informs how work is done and enables future workforce to ensure the council is fit for the long term, significant
planning. There is a hunger for an ‘outcome-focused, changes will be made to the way it operates. The way
evidence-based approach to life’ and for line managers to services are provided by BCC will fundamentally change from
have the capabilities required to make sense of the data, a direct service delivery model to one of commissioning. In
telling staff what they need to do to improve performance. addition, the directorate of study are currently undergoing a
The challenge is to ensure context is taken into account restructure with significant job redesign.
when analysing performance data, to enable the metrics to
be interpreted intelligently. Also during the action phase, through the excellence
in people management programme activity, managers
Leadership support for people management were given access to a significant amount of workforce
Leaders advocating the importance of the excellence in information to inform their decision-making and drive
people management programme were seen as integral to workforce planning. As part of this, the performance
its success. The support for HR in local government is seen development reviews were rolled out and managers had
as ‘a once in a lifetime opportunity’ to drive the people access to new online tools for HR services. In addition,
agenda forward. It is felt that there is a passion for change communication continued about the large-scale changes in
from the chief executive, but also a desire that this passion the council.
be quickly distilled throughout the organisation for change
to be embraced by all. Phase 2: Our key findings
In phase 2 there were three main focuses of the research.
Sharing knowledge and learning First, we looked at what had changed in the intervening 12
It was felt that spending time evaluating projects and months in terms of strategic priorities and core purpose.
sharing learning would be a key enabler of long-term Second, we reviewed the potential drivers of sustainable
performance. Line managers stressed the importance of performance that had been identified in phase 1, both
evaluating projects and sharing learning both within teams those specific to the council and those identified across all
and across the organisation, with some teams reporting six of our case study organisations. Third, we looked once
doing this within their regular meetings. Senior managers again at the barriers and enablers of both individual and
also share these sentiments, keen to promote cross-team organisational performance and recommended further
and cross-functional learning. actions.

Technology Strategic priorities

A challenge for Birmingham City Council is developing The council’s strategy has remained the same but
skills and competence around technology use. More interviewees feel that it is being delivered in a different
fundamentally, access to technology is a major challenge, way. The emphasis is still on effectively delivering services,
with IT links not being as good as they could be and so but with a greater focus on efficiency in the context of
can be frustrating for managers. However, the potential resource constraints. Interviewees also made reference to
benefits of the new computer system are seen as positive. the political context in which BCC operates and the need
to stay abreast of political decisions that may affect how it
Research into action operates.
As mentioned, we had regular meetings with our key
contacts in the intervening ten-month period between the Core purpose
two phases of data collection. One of the key issues facing At all levels people feel that the core purpose of Birmingham
Birmingham City Council at this time was the recession City Council has not changed over the last 12 months. Staff
and the impending public spending cuts. The business are passionate about being able to deliver a good-quality
transformation programme was given even greater priority service and improve the lives of the people of Birmingham
within the council as a result of the economic challenges and keen that this core purpose should be at the heart of
due to the potential benefits for sustainable performance. what the council does, despite the current context.

Shaping the Future final report 53

Provision of better workforce information The council is working to ensure communication is a
As mentioned, in phase 1 a priority for Birmingham City performance enabler, with senior managers running road
Council was to increase the workforce information made shows and drop-in sessions across the city. Interviewees
available to managers through the workforce scorecards, feel the downward communication about the strategy
performance development reviews and tools from HR. They and vision is generally good, and more attention is being
identified this focus as critical for sustainability. given to upward communication. ‘Have your say’ sessions
where employees can ask questions are reported positively
When we examined these issues in phase 2, managers at all and people would like more opportunities to be involved
levels said that the PDRs are fundamental to the provision in decision-making by putting their views forward. There
of better workforce information and equip them to see is also a challenge for line managers in translating the key
more readily where they are performing well and what messages for staff in terms of what it means for them.
issues are emerging that might cause performance to drop.
A key enabler of performance is sharing knowledge and
Senior managers talked of their value in aligning what learning within the council. Middle and line managers
people do in their job roles with the overall objectives of talked about the value of sharing knowledge and learning
the council. Linked to this are the levels of performance with their peers, especially during periods of change and
and accompanying behaviours expected of people. The when new systems and processes are introduced. The
value of the PDRs at an organisational level is to have majority of people we spoke to in the focus groups told
workforce data that can be fed back into the organisation us about formal networks and also informal ones they
and inform its future direction and broader talent had established to do this. There are also opportunities to
management activities. exchange ideas through the SAP system and BCC is further
promoting internal knowledge-sharing, recognising more
Line managers report that the clarity of objectives via the could be done to share learning between directorates.
PDRs is an enabler of performance as it is clear to staff
what they are supposed to do and what success looks like. What does the future look like?
The HR tools made available give managers the information Our final question to managers was to ask what changes
they need to manage their team and make informed they feel might be necessary in the future to ensure that
decisions. The council is ensuring that managers have the Birmingham City Council is able to sustain its performance
capability required to analyse and act on the information at over the long term.
their fingertips.
Although faced with tough economic challenges, senior
Overall, the improved workforce intelligence is driving the managers feel that the large-scale business transformation
workforce strategy, informing decisions. The workforce programme they have undertaken, which includes the
information now available uses a strengths-based focus on effective workforce management, will put the
approach, which is being used to manage the restructuring council in a stronger position for the future.
in a fairer way, enabling BCC to identify and try to retain its
key talent. Managers at all levels said it is of paramount importance to
ensure that staff have the skills and capabilities needed by
Enablers and threats to performance the council in the future. They also feel that both the focus
Across the council, a strong enabler of performance is the on clear and consistent communications and the strong
engagement people have with the service users, the people level of engagement of staff to provide a good-quality
of Birmingham. As well as being concerned about how service must be maintained.
the changes in BCC will affect their own roles, staff are
also concerned about how they will affect the service user.
They are keen to go the extra mile to ensure that a good-
quality service is maintained, despite fewer resources being
available.

54 Shaping the Future final report

NHS Dumfries and Galloway: dynamic delivery Phase 1: In search of sustainability
in difficult times Our phase 1 research identified a number of issues related
to sustainable performance at NHS Dumfries and Galloway.
The context
NHS Dumfries and Galloway serves 149,000 residents Organisational purpose
and employs 5,000 people across an area of 2,400 Most employees identified and engaged with Dumfries and
square miles. The board has embarked on an ambitious Galloway’s core purpose of improving healthcare in the
modernisation programme in line with the NHS Scotland’s region and tackling health inequalities.
health plan, Better Health, Better Care (2007), and has
undertaken a number of major change initiatives including The Delivering Dynamic Improvement programme
significant restructuring of job roles and responsibilities. A DDI has been a major organisational change and
new hospital building project, which has evolved through transformation project and its legacy needs careful
cost pressures into developing a business case for the management. This change capability-building programme
refurbishment of the existing site, is perhaps the biggest encourages cross-functional working, knowledge-sharing,
operational challenge. A day-to-day challenge is to meet ownership and innovation across teams and professional
the Scottish Government’s Health Efficiency Access and boundaries. The initiative has also increased engagement
Treatment (HEAT) targets – nationwide targets for the NHS and alignment with the strategic priorities of the board and
in Scotland. Other key focuses for the NHS board are to ultimately helped the organisation to manage the current
reduce the number of hospital-acquired infections (HAIs), challenges facing the public sector.
and improve patient safety and quality of care.
Such is its popularity some have seen it as a permanent
The board has taken a lead role in innovation to address change programme. The management restructure means
organisational issues. Its innovative Delivering Dynamic that the key delivery managers are now much closer to
Improvement programme (DDI), which we investigated, the action and the reconfiguration of some functions has
is a case in point. This programme was designed to equip created greater alignment within the organisation.
managers and clinical leaders with the knowledge and
skills to build shared responsibilities for delivering dynamic People
continuous improvements in the services provided to The prevailing view from interviewees was that Dumfries
patients. The board is also involved in various government and Galloway employs high-quality, committed people at all
pilots, including the mutual health service concept. levels. Employees are passionate about patient care and get
a sense of personal satisfaction from achieving the aims of
Our research journey the board, which will support the long-term performance
The first phase of data collection was carried out between of the organisation.
August and September 2009 and the second during
September and October 2010. In the intervening time period Communication
we met regularly with key contacts to discuss the actions being Communication was viewed as generally positive and
taken as a result of the phase 1 findings and the challenges employees were keen that the restructure enabled them to
faced by the health board, in particular the economic pressures. feed their views upwards effectively.

A key priority for NHS Dumfries and Galloway is to Career progression and talent development
continue to build management capability. Therefore the These were viewed as potential enablers of performance.
research focuses on the DDI programme and in particular Employees in many areas felt that being involved in
post-DDI activity, as well as how the management continuous improvement projects, such as DDI, would
restructure of April 2010 is contributing to building a enable them to develop themselves and their career.
culture of innovation and positive change needed for long-
term sustainability. In addition, the research addresses what Cross-functional working
enables and gets in the way of sustainable organisation This was seen as a key enabler of sustainable performance,
performance more generally. which was being encouraged by a number of HR and
operational initiatives around patient care, efficiency and
productivity.

Shaping the Future final report 55

Research into action Strategic priorities and core purpose
In the intervening period between phases 1 and 2 of Strategic priorities have remained stable over the last 12
data collection we had regular meetings with our key months. Although most people feel the strategic priorities
contacts in the organisation. NHS Dumfries and Galloway still hinge around the four cornerstones of quality, finance,
faced various challenges during this period, including the service and people, they believe that the current climate
stringent financial settlement in the wider NHS, the new, has increased the organisation’s focus on costs and
reduced settlement for health care in the UK, the impact of efficiency. However, we saw a clear commitment from the
the UK general election in May 2010 and the subsequent leadership team to ensure the short-term financial pressures
public sector spending review. In addition, Dumfries and do not dominate the long-term vision, citing the ten-year
Galloway has volunteered to be part of a pilot for testing clinical services strategy consultation process as an example
the introduction of locally elected boards. of this.

Through its continuous improvement programme, DDI, Organisation purpose

and its focused leadership, senior leaders at Dumfries There is a strong sense of shared purpose at all levels, with
and Galloway feel the workforce are well prepared for many unsolicited comments about how positive people
the lean times ahead in health care. As in all public sector feel to be working for an organisation that carries out a
organisations, the financial constraints have made it vital service in the community and that could have such a
necessary to address the issue of productivity in the context positive impact on the population. It is clear that this sense
of greater efficiency as the organisation seeks to drive value of shared purpose supports other enablers of performance
out of its existing resource. The configuration of the new such as role clarity, communication, and respect and
general management and their teams, for example, has recognition.
been focused on further driving efficiencies, while the other
key drivers of patient safety, quality and people still remain Employee engagement
centre of attention. At NHS Dumfries and Galloway there has been a huge
amount of work into driving employee engagement as
During this action phase Dumfries and Galloway this is seen as critical for long-term performance. The
implemented some of our recommendations from the organisation as a whole scored well in the last Scottish
phase 1 findings. In particular they put in place actions Government-initiated employee survey, which compares
to move beyond the first year of the DDI programme employee attitudes across health boards in Scotland.
that could focus the energy of DDI and build upon the The results from this survey are actively fed back to staff
knowledge-sharing and cross-functional working it through presentations and workshops. Issues are identified,
promoted, which were critical outputs. tested with staff groups and acted upon.

Phase 2: Our key findings Leadership

In phase 2 we collected data in three main areas. First, Dumfries and Galloway is cultivating a distributed
we looked at what had changed in the intervening 12 leadership approach that draws on the technical and
months in terms of strategic priorities and core purpose. professional capability of leaders and managers in
Second, we reviewed the potential drivers of sustainable both clinical and non-clinical areas. The value of having
performance that had been identified in phase 1, both engaged and transformational leaders is espoused by the
those specific to Dumfries and Galloway and those Government as being vital to the sustainability of the NHS.
identified across all six case study organisations. Finally,
we looked once again at the barriers and enablers of both Continuous improvement
individual and organisational performance. DDI works by sharing information and expertise across
boundaries and by unlocking the problem-solving
potential of highly engaged teams. As the first year of
the DDI programme was focused on middle managers,
the challenge now is to cascade and instil this continuous
improvement philosophy throughout the rest of the
organisation.

56 Shaping the Future final report

A challenge for NHS Dumfries and Galloway is to overcome
the perception of ‘this is how we’ve always done things’,
particularly in occupational groups that have strongly
forged identities. The board wants to further develop and
harness a culture focused on team success and positive
change and opportunity.

Enablers and threats to performance

Perhaps the biggest enabler of sustainable performance is
a clear sense of purpose that allows staff to engage with
the community that they serve through a person-centred
approach. The improvements in cross-functional working
and communication are also considered to be enablers and
help with the achievement of the organisation’s purpose.
Managers also highlighted that knowledge-sharing has
significantly enabled performance.

Internally the biggest threat to performance was identified

as a ‘disconnected’ middle management layer, which DDI
sought to address with noticeably positive results. The
current challenge is to maintain their engagement during
the new programme of management change.

What does the future look like?

A number of external pressures related to the economic
and political environment continue to pose a challenge
for the health board. At the time of data collection D&G
were attempting to reduce costs by 4%, leading to robust
vacancy management, a review of fixed-term contracts and
other measures. At the same time NHS staff face public
sector pay and pension pressures, all of which can have an
impact on engagement and motivation.

Dumfries and Galloway are continuing to focus on

management development. In addition they are engaging
in knowledge-sharing with other NHS boards and trusts
to drive organisational learning and developing projects
to promote engagement with the wider community, all of
which will help them to sustain their performance over time.

Shaping the Future final report 57

Pfizer (Grange Castle)’s journey towards environment based on good employee relations, high
operational excellence employee involvement and participation, as well as minimal
rules and policies where feasible.
The context
Pfizer’s Grange Castle campus site represents a significant Leadership
investment in biotechnology facilities. It is one of the Managers and employees emphasised the importance of
largest integrated biotechceutical campuses in Europe. strong and visible leaders with good interpersonal skills and
solid decision-making. This was agreed as worthy of more
Pfizer (Grange Castle), like many of our other case studies, focus around the areas of decision-making, vision-making
has experienced an unparalleled amount of change and closing the feedback loop.
over the period of our research. When we last visited in
June 2009, the merger of Wyeth and Pfizer had been Organisation and role design
announced but had not begun. Visiting over a year later in Effective, supportive and decisive teamwork is seen as an
September 2010, Wyeth Grange Castle had now become enabler of sustainable organisation performance. Respondents
Pfizer (Grange Castle). sought further opportunities to break down barriers between
different functional areas to support performance.
The focus of our research with Pfizer (Grange Castle) has
been the impact of continuous operational improvements Performance management
and lean transformation projects (based on lean Six Sigma Employees felt that greater clarity on metrics, in particular
techniques) as enablers of sustainable performance. those paid attention to by senior managers, was needed
and assisted in managing performance. The work on lean
Our research journey projects has helped with this as well as making it clearer
The first phase of Shaping the Future data collection was how these metrics relate to particular job roles.
carried out in June 2009 and the second in September
2010. A series of meetings were held with the key Lean transformation projects
contact in between phases, to stay close to the issues The mini transformation projects were perceived as
and challenges they were facing and to review suggested very successful from a business perspective. They have
actions and developments in the wider environment. helped to streamline production, removing inefficiencies
in operational processes, as well as releasing employees
In addition to exploring the impact of continuous to be transferred into other production areas. There was
operational improvements, the research addresses what an ongoing challenge around identifying appropriate
enables and gets in the way of sustainable organisation measures to assess the outcomes of planned continuous
performance more generally. improvement changes.

Phase 1: In search of sustainability Talent and development planning

Our phase 1 research identified a number of aspects related The level of clarity around career paths and opportunities
to sustainable performance at Pfizer (Grange Castle). was also linked to sustainable organisation performance.
An agreed action following the research was to broaden
Organisation purpose understanding of what constitutes development (such as
Managers and employees felt that clarity about the flexibility and lateral movement) and to build that into the
organisation’s purpose and the ability to connect to that talent development systems.
purpose enabled sustainable organisation performance.
Research into action
Organisation culture The 14 months in between the two fieldwork phases
Respondents felt that a high-performance, high-trust was spent on research into action. Pfizer (Grange Castle)
culture is a true enabler of sustainable performance. reflected on the research feedback and sent the full report
This culture has been developed at Grange Castle from to associate directors to keep the issues on their radar.
the start, led by senior managers who have a number of The findings were also discussed at the leadership team
guiding principles: a desire to build a high-trust work meeting in January.

58 Shaping the Future final report

HR alongside the business started work on the following There has been a focus on leadership and communication
Shaping the Future suggested development areas: in the last 12 months to help employees through the
many changes experienced, and maintain focus on
• providing clearer visibility to staff about different roles the organisation’s goals. Communications have been
available across the business continuous through a number of different channels
• providing supervisor training to line managers including quarterly ‘All Hands’ updates, ‘Make Sure We
• breaking down the barriers between cross-functional Talk’ sessions, and a recent leadership conference.
silos
• closing the feedback loop from the ‘make sure we talk’ Core purpose
communication sessions. Most interviewees feel that the core purpose of the
organisation has not changed. Patient centrality is
The merger between Wyeth and Pfizer also took place emphasised, with some believing this has become even
in this period. Amongst other things this brought a keen more important working for Pfizer. Where change has
focus on management engagement (with a new set of been noticed reference was made to greater business and
tools), the introduction of the Gallup engagement survey commercial orientation, with others feeling there to be an
and a move to a more centralised approach to HR and IT. even greater focus on safety.

Phase 2: Our key findings Continuous improvement

In phase 2 we collected data in three main areas. First, The overall consensus is that continuous improvement
we looked at what had changed in the intervening 12 is now firmly embedded into everyday practices
months in terms of strategic priorities and core purpose. and is ‘business as usual’. Senior managers feel that
Second, we reviewed the potential drivers of sustainable employees are now taking more ownership of continuous
performance that had been identified in phase 1, both improvement processes and believe that the Pfizer
those specific to Pfizer (Grange Castle) and those identified approach to training and consistency is helping to further
across all six case study organisations. Finally, we looked drive this focus. Along with continuous improvement
once again at the barriers and enablers to both individual processes, there has been training in mindset and
and organisational performance. behaviours for all supervisors and managers.

Strategic priorities Performance management

The senior managers that we spoke with highlighted a Continuous improvement systems and area targets linked
number of synergies between legacy Wyeth and Pfizer. Two to the bonus system mean that people know what their
of the strongest synergies are around performance and role is and how that contributes to their team and the site’s
operational excellence. performance.

In recent months Grange Castle took part in a corporate Employees seek senior manager recognition through
study as part of an evaluation of the role of the site within performance management of the ‘routine work that is the
Pfizer. The result confirmed the role of Grange Castle and organisation’s “bread and butter”’, rather than ‘glamorising
will result in growth in business here. The senior managers project work and money saving’. With the organisation
highlighted the importance of the site therefore continuing experiencing so much change, the regular review of own
to grow and change. Employees noted seeing an increase targets and that of the team needs continuous attention.
in the volume of product produced as well as expecting
new products at Grange Castle. The increase in the volume Cross-functional working
of manufacturing makes the site’s focus on continuous Employees who had trained in another area or had been on
improvement even more important. secondments to a different area of the business talk positively
about their experiences. Employees feel cross-training will
The economic situation in the Republic of Ireland has help with resourcing flexibility, and are keen to continue to
significantly worsened over the last 12 months and although have opportunities to work in the areas in which they are
this hasn’t negatively impacted on Grange Castle, it serves to trained, to preserve the skills they have learned.
remind employees how fortunate they are to have job security.

Shaping the Future final report 59

Enablers and threats to performance
Some feel that becoming part of a larger organisation
provides an ongoing challenge to future performance
where communication can be less personal and more
top–down in approach. They confirmed the need to keep
a sense of shared purpose and continue to engage and
empower people with the business through organisational
effectiveness initiatives.

Line managers/supervisors and employees suggest that a

real enabler of performance is setting clear objectives and
targets for individuals and teams. It is important to not only
establish clear objectives but then regularly review those
objectives: ‘don’t be afraid to reassess.’

A final enabler of individual performance and motivation

is providing people with opportunities for development
and different roles. A potential challenge currently being
addressed is how to communicate opportunities when
the organisation is going through constant change while
ensuring organisational discipline to communicate helpful
feedback to unsuccessful candidates.

What does the future look like?

Our final question to managers was to ask what changes
they feel might be necessary in the future to ensure
that Pfizer (Grange Castle) sustains its high levels of
performance.

Senior managers talked about building a picture of

the future – setting the big picture and context for all
to engage with. Management style is seen to be really
important in building this engagement, continuing to
promote innovation and operational excellence, and giving
people the tools and ability to perform well.

60 Shaping the Future final report

Standard Chartered – using engagement to Phase 1: In search of sustainability
drive business performance Our phase 1 research identified a number of issues related to
sustainable performance in Standard Chartered, Hong Kong.
The context
Standard Chartered has a history of more than 150 years Long-term vision
in banking and is in many of the world’s fastest-growing Employees understand the bank’s vision and goals and they
markets. The bank employs more than 80,000 people, stressed the importance of doing what is right for the bank
representing 115 nationalities worldwide. It is listed in the in the long term. In particular, it is seen as important for
London, Hong Kong and India stock exchanges. The group all staff to have an awareness of risk, speaking up when
derives more than 90% of its operating income and profits necessary.
from Asia, Africa and the Middle East, generated from its
wholesale and consumer banking businesses. Customer focus
Employees stress the importance of understanding
The research is focused on the bank’s Hong Kong business, customer needs and how these change over time. It is
which it has been operating in for more than 150 years apparent that providing excellent customer service is a key
and currently has more than 5,500 employees. In Hong priority for staff, particularly in phase 1 when consumer
Kong the external environment has significantly changed confidence in banking was low.
since phase 1 of the research, which was conducted just
after the Lehmann collapse. Although there is a common Culture
feeling that the bank rode the financial tsunami well – it is The bank has a high-performance culture but emphasises
now in its seventh year of substantial growth – its activities the need for high levels of performance to be achieved
have been affected by the aftermath of the crisis. There through demonstration of the bank’s values. These values
is increased regulation and a particular need to keep are strongly embedded in the bank because of their clarity
growing consumer confidence in banking, which Standard and consistency. Interviewees stressed the importance of
Chartered is doing through concentrating on getting the being self-driven and motivated to ensure that an excellent
basics of banking right. job is done, but also the value of working as a team.
Employees view their teams as families and they talked
The focus of our research with Standard Chartered is on about the importance of learning from each other to
engagement as a key driver of business performance and share best practice. However, a high attrition rate poses a
critical in achieving sustainable high performance. The challenge for the bank in building this desired culture.
Hong Kong operation was selected for study in recognition
of the advances it has made in driving employee Top leadership
engagement, which has been shown to be a driver of Employees report that the top team is very supportive of
business performance, even in challenging external engagement, encouraging it in their behaviour as well as
circumstances. in their communications. Staff talked enthusiastically about
both top leadership and middle managers being highly
Our research journey visible to them, walking the floor and visiting branches.
The first phase of Shaping the Future data collection was The management style valued is one of a coach, not
carried out in February and March 2009 and the second just pushing sales. Employees appreciate good people
in September 2010. A series of meetings were held with managers who have an understanding of the business.
the key contacts in between phases, to stay close to the
issues and challenges the bank was facing and to review Communication
suggested actions and developments the bank had put in Clear and consistent communication about the direction
place in response to the phase 1 findings. of the bank is cascaded to all levels and viewed as an
enabler of sustainable performance. Employees also trust
In addition to exploring the impact of engagement activity, the communications they receive, with the personal style
the research also addresses what enables and gets in being easy to relate to. Employees talked about the positive
the way of sustainable organisation performance more benefits of establishing informal contacts within the bank,
generally. especially between functions. Having informal contacts

Shaping the Future final report 61

enables them to share client information, hence provide • Introduce workshops and a regular newsletter for
excellent customer service. managers to share engagement best practices and
success stories across functions as well as to celebrate
Performance management successes.
Employees have a clear understanding of how performance
is measured and how personal objectives relate to the • Maintain the high visibility of senior leaders and extend
bank’s objectives. In the short term, financial reward is to middle managers.
valued; in the long term, career progression is valued,
whether that be vertical or horizontal. Phase 2: Our key findings
In phase 2 we collected data in three main areas. First, we
People looked at what had changed since phase 1 in terms of
Employees are proud to work for Standard Chartered strategic priorities and core purpose. Second, we reviewed
and feel they are valued, having the freedom to make the potential drivers of sustainable performance that had
decisions within clear guidelines. To progress within the been identified in phase 1, both those specific to Standard
bank it is necessary to behave in a way consistent with the Chartered, Hong Kong, and those identified across all
organisation’s values. six case study organisations. Finally, we looked once
again at the barriers and enablers to both individual and
Organisational design organisational performance.
The size and complex matrix structure of the bank poses
a challenge in terms of promoting cross-functional Strategic priorities and core purpose
working and enhancing the speed by which information is Across the business people feel Standard Chartered’s
transmitted across the organisation. The bank sees cross- mission – to be ‘the world’s best international bank leading
functional working as an area for improvement. the way in Asia, Africa and the Middle East’ – and strategy
is well communicated with five clear priorities acting as
Employee engagement road signs. The consistency of the strategy, core purpose
Employees appreciate the importance of being engaged, and organisational values are perceived as a strength as
advocating its benefits for both short-term and long- well as the top team reinforcing them through events such
term performance. They have interpreted its worth for as town hall meetings.
themselves, internalising the value of engagement, which
was demonstrated by the range of answers employees gave Employees feel the bank was supportive during the difficult
when asked why the bank endeavours to engage staff. times and they are proud to say they work for what they
The engagement process itself is purposefully loose and perceive to be a stable bank with a good position in Hong
simple, which are its strengths. The engagement survey is Kong.
short and easily understood, which contributes to its high
response rate. The impact planning process that follows the The bank faces a challenge from the external environment
survey results is owned by individual teams, who are able in terms of attrition. Since phase 1 of the research, the
to tailor the process to their particular needs, which in turn jobs market has picked up and more people are moving
feeds their enthusiastic adoption of engagement. to different organisations, particularly in customer-facing
roles. The bank directs specific attention to the new starters
Research into action attracted to the organisation to ensure they feel engaged
The 18 months in between the two fieldwork phases was and part of SCB as quickly as possible.
spent on research into action. Standard Chartered, Hong
Kong, reflected on the research feedback and the HR Cross-functional working
team started work on the following Shaping the Future Ensuring functions work together to provide a seamless
suggested development areas: service to the customer and operate as ‘one bank’ is a
key priority. In certain areas of the bank cross-functional
• Provide the opportunity for employees to establish cross- working has clearly improved.
functional links, enable the sharing of knowledge and
learning experiences to enhance both engagement and As in phase 1, employees feel that informally establishing
working relationships. networks helps them in their job role and is part of the culture

62 Shaping the Future final report

of the bank and that individual teams need to ensure that say they have noticed a step-change in communications
knowledge-sharing is two-way. However, in this second phase with the CEO and other senior leaders using a much more
of the research, employees and managers alike spoke more personal style, talking about their family and experiences
about the importance of establishing links, both with other outside of work as well as formal messages.
countries in the region and globally to share knowledge, citing
examples of secondments and opportunities for learning and Enablers and threats to performance
knowledge-sharing in this area. The bank is committed to drive performance through
engagement and Hong Kong strives to sustain the
Engagement engagement momentum of the past ten years. The most
Both employees and managers talked passionately important thing for interviewees is maintaining a strong
about the bank’s engagement activity, particularly about focus on driving engagement because there is always room
volunteering, with many great stories of the opportunities for improvement. In addition, some managers talked of the
they have to take part in projects that broaden their importance of ensuring the Q12 data is interpreted in the
horizons and make a difference in the community. context of qualitative data, with the true value not being in
the engagement score itself but in the regular, meaningful
Managers commented on the work of HR on driving conversations, impact planning and activity around it.
engagement through the engagement newsletter and
the best practice sharing sessions, which have been well A performance enabler for employees is around careers
received. These have helped managers to establish links and the importance of managers having regular career and
across the bank and to understand other functions. They development conversations with employees to maintain
have also increased the visibility of middle managers. Teams their engagement and to retain talent through helping
talked about engagement activity being a regular item on them see a long-term future with the bank.
the agenda of their meetings, and about the social activities
they had arranged as a team to show that they care about Employees feel that the shared services centres in
each other. Chennai are being more included as one bank and that
the relationship can be further strengthened to achieve
Feedback from managers seamless collaboration.
Interviewees value managers and leaders who are
consistent and up front with people, set clear expectations Interviewees feel that the activity the bank is undertaking
for performance and give feedback in a positive tone. Also, to develop the product knowledge of customer-focused
recognition for good performance is highly valued by all staff and vice versa is further increasing the customer-
employees. Some employees suggested they would like to centricity of the organisation and will help to differentiate
receive more feedback from managers on suggestions they the bank from its competitors.
have made, even if those suggestions are not adopted.
What does the future look like?
Shared purpose Our final question to managers was to ask what changes
There is a clear sense of purpose shared across all our they feel might be necessary in the future to ensure that
interviewees. Many have developed an emotional Standard Chartered, Hong Kong, sustains its high levels of
connection to the bank and this seems to be heightened performance.
by the ‘Here for Good’ campaign. A shared motivation
and engagement to go the extra mile is also demonstrated Quite a few managers commented that given the ongoing
by many employees for the good of the company, the changes in the macro environment, we have to provide
customer and the community. continuous support and equip our people with the right
skills and knowledge that the bank will need in the long
Visibility of senior leaders term and that continuous development of people is
In phase 1 of the research we noted the high visibility essential for sustainability.
of leaders, which was positively reported by staff and
maintained through town halls, the senior team’s pledge and Continuing to focus on employee engagement will
role-modelling from seniors. Over the past year employees differentiate the bank from competitors; other things can

Shaping the Future final report 63

be imitated or developed quickly, but not engagement.
Work–life balance is a concern for some employees and
they hope managers can provide support to balance their
needs in different stages throughout the life cycle.

The quality of leaders and line managers is reported as

another key factor for long-term performance, giving the
bank the power to excel in the good and the bad times.
Managers should continue to encourage employees where
possible to give their opinions and use their knowledge to
generate solutions and problem-solve.

Finally, it is also important to keep an eye on the long-term

horizon, looking at the market and balancing client needs
with regulatory implications, all of which will affect how
business is conducted.

64 Shaping the Future final report

Sharing the learning at Xerox developments and actions that had been taken as a result
of the issues identified in phase 1 of the research. We also
Xerox has three core business areas: Office Products, conducted two focus groups with employees from the
Production Solutions and Document Outsourcing. wider Xerox business to test out some of the findings from
Global Document Outsourcing has been identified as a the GDO Service Delivery team and make comparisons
growth engine for the business and provides a document between the business operations.
management and print management outsourcing service.
Four years ago Xerox identified one of their core priorities Phase 1: In search of sustainability
as wanting to be the leader in this highly competitive field. Our phase 1 research identified a number of issues related
to sustainable performance at Xerox.
In 2007 Xerox set up a partnership service to provide
document services to a central government department. Organisational purpose
This partnership service has a seven-year contract with the The GDO Service Delivery team were very clear on their
client and operates as a separate business unit within Xerox purpose – to service their customer. They also felt proud
with its own IT, programme management and finance to be part of the GDO Service Delivery team, with some
departments. Its remit is to provide a responsive service to describing themselves as trailblazers. This strong sense of
the client throughout the course of the contract, identifying purpose was only partly reflected in the wider business,
innovative and effective ways to deliver print services, while with most people other than senior managers appearing to
achieving both cost and efficiency savings. The GDO Service identify most strongly with the business unit they worked in.
Delivery contract was seen as a model that could inform
other business opportunities. Customer focus
The GDO Service Delivery employees believed they needed
The GDO Service Delivery business unit provided the focus to develop their relationships with their customer to
for the Shaping the Future research. The research explored anticipate their needs and deliver the core elements of the
not only the drivers of sustainable performance in the GDO contract. In Xerox there was also evidence that the majority
Service Delivery team but how these compared with the of employees are customer-driven and this focus is enabling
wider Xerox business and what lessons might be captured the development of the service side of the business.
to inform future contracts.
Business process
Halfway through our research, Xerox acquired the US Process was identified as a barrier to performance by
business, Affiliated Computer Services (ACS), a large GDO Service Delivery employees. Xerox employees felt
outsourcing company. This business has only a small less constrained by processes but commented negatively if
presence in Europe but by using the existing Xerox processes were not sufficiently linked or contradicted each
infrastructure it has an opportunity to enhance its customer other. Xerox has a programme running called A2B (Average
proposition and grow ACS outside of the US. It has also to Benchmark), which is examining the business processes
shifted the balance of Xerox from a business primarily and aiming for effective streamlining with the active
selling and servicing hardware to a service-based business. involvement of a range of staff. Employees felt pleased to
This acquisition has a number of implications, which were be involved in this improvement initiative and felt able to
explored in phase 2 of the research. put forward the requirements of their business area.

Our research journey Performance measures

The first phase of data collection was carried out with In the GDO Service Delivery team performance measures
Xerox between April and August 2009 and the second were about having ambitions and positive objectives.
during September 2010. As well as focusing on the Because GDO Service Delivery employees are close to the
learning from the GDO Service Delivery business, we business, the direct impact of their actions on performance
examined the wider question of what enables and gets in were very visible to them and helped to drive a sense of
the way of sustainable organisation performance. purpose. Within the wider Xerox business, interviewees
felt that the emphasis was on tangible results to measure
In the intervening time period we conducted a series performance.
of meetings with our key contacts to discuss any

Shaping the Future final report 65

Cross-functional working Within the GDO Service Delivery team some of our phase 1
Employees identified cross-functional working, both internally findings and suggested actions were implemented to
among Xerox staff and externally with client and partner inform their people management work. In particular they
organisations, as essential to achieving their key priorities. This put in place actions to improve the quality of management
fits with the view of senior managers who see working across information, enhance cross-functional working and
functional boundaries as an essential element of the customer- improve knowledge-sharing.
centric approach that Xerox is trying to build.
Phase 2: Our key findings
Culture In phase 2 we collected data in three main areas. First,
All employees believed that culture was an enabler of we looked at what had changed in the intervening 12
performance, with many referring to the Xerox culture as months since phase 1 in terms of strategic priorities and
‘can do’ or ‘no blame’. core purpose. Second, we reviewed the potential drivers of
sustainable performance that had been identified in phase 1,
Communication both those specific to Xerox and those identified across
Communication was, on the whole, viewed positively all six case study organisations. Finally, we looked once
across Xerox. In the GDO Service Delivery team, employees again at the barriers and enablers of both individual and
felt the communication they received enabled them to organisational performance.
understand the needs of their customer. In the wider
business, breakdowns in communications were identified as Strategic priorities
a significant inhibitor of performance if it prevented people Within the GDO Service Delivery team there is agreement
from inputting to the process in a timely fashion. that the core priorities of the business are still focused on
the need to retain the contract and return value to the
Leadership customer: ‘Retain and Return’. There are indications that
Managers who recognise good performance were seen the current emphasis on cost has also promoted even
to energise and motivate people to perform. Across Xerox greater emphasis on effectiveness and adding value – core
significant efforts were being devoted to management elements of the contract. There are some frustrations
development to enhance the leadership skills of managers. that the tough economic challenges have resulted in less
investment in staff, with pay freezes and little scope to
People reward performance. However, employees attach value to
Social networking within the business was seen as a key receiving recognition when reward is not possible.
driver of success. In the GDO Service Delivery team there
was also a discernible sense of team pride. Across Xerox, managers feel that there are two main
changes in the business that affect how it operates. One
Action phase – keeping ahead of developments is the acquisition of ACS and the associated implications
During the period between the phase 1 and phase 2 data for Xerox as a service business. The second is having a
collection we had regular meetings with our key contact in new CEO, whose stated aim is to make Xerox a more
the organisation. One of the key issues facing Xerox was performance-driven company, pushing accountability down
the recession. This had a particular impact on the GDO through the business to the front line.
Service Delivery team: at the beginning of the downturn
there was an increase in the demand for document services Cross-functional working
due to the nature of the client’s business. However, the This was identified as an area for improvement in phase 1
spending review and consequent spending freeze imposed and actions were implemented. When we examined these
by the incoming government in May 2010 has resulted in issues in phase 2, it appears that cross-functional working
a significant decrease in demand and decrease in revenue has improved. This is most apparent in the GDO Service
– hence the increased drive to deliver print services in Delivery team, where there is a wealth of evidence that
innovative ways that focus on cost and efficiency. people have developed a better understanding of their own
role and how it relates to others, therefore contributing to
The other big changes in the organisation were the a wider process of performance improvement.
acquisition of ACS, described above, and the arrival of a
new CEO early in 2010.

66 Shaping the Future final report

Business processes Shared purpose
A number of initiatives have helped to mitigate many of As in phase 1, the sense of shared purpose is extremely
the negative comments around process from phase 1. strong in the GDO Service Delivery team, with a high
In the GDO Service Delivery team, process improvement degree of shared understanding about the challenges
teams are looking at individual processes and redesigning facing both the GDO Service Delivery team and its client.
them in line with the needs of the business. In the wider Employees have a strong desire to have the contract
Xerox business, the A2B programme is seeking to cluster renewed. However, the extent of the shared purpose is less
process at the European rather than the country level and clear in the wider business, although the stated aims of
transform and redesign processes to ensure accountability managers are to improve in this area as they believe it will
and a more streamlined service. help drive performance.

Significant efforts have been made to improve Enablers and threats to performance
management information and both managers and In the GDO Service Delivery team there is agreement from
employees say this has helped them inform the customer people at all levels that the overall performance indicators
of benefits and improvements and deliver a better service. are around the issues of ‘Retain and Return’ as well as
bottom-line numbers. However, currently there are some
Leadership strong views that revenue and gross profit are the things
Leadership skill at all levels of the organisation was identified that matter to Xerox.
as another potential driver of long-term performance. In the
GDO Service Delivery team generally people feel this has The GDO Service Delivery employees feel that teamwork,
improved since phase 1. There is a positive consensus on the clear objectives and realistic expectations enable
leadership capabilities of the general managers and people performance. Managers are also important in setting
generally feel there have been efforts to push accountability a clear direction, empowering and recognising good
further down the organisation to enable people to take performance. Another important enabler is effective
more control over their work. communication as well as having the right tools for the job,
including the right development and training. For managers
Capturing and analysing management information in particular, the main enabler is being empowered to make
The improvements made to the management information business improvements.
system have significantly enhanced the flow of information;
however, there is still little evidence about how this At the wider Xerox level there is a prevailing view that
information is used. Within the GDO Service Delivery team, cross-functional and particularly cross-country working is an
managers feel that there is still a process of permission- important enabler of global performance. There is a degree
seeking before people feel confident to act on the of expectation from managers that this issue is particularly
information they have. One vehicle that everyone agrees is important to the integration of the ACS acquisition and
having a positive impact is business improvement teams, the ability to leverage value from the synergies and added
made up of representatives from different departments with opportunities this will create for major customers.
a remit to use their working knowledge of business processes
to streamline the management information system. Threats to performance identified by the GDO Service
Delivery team employees include demotivated people,
Cross-functional working uncertainty caused by the current economic climate and
Within the GDO Service Delivery team there have been government spending cuts as well as pay freezes and a lack
significant improvements in this area, manifested in better of recognition for effort. Fear is another potential threat
understanding of the various functional roles and how to performance – fear of failing, fear of trying new things,
they support each other, as well as a greater clarity around fear of getting it wrong, fear of challenging the status quo
process. It is difficult to gauge the extent to which cross- and fear of change.
functional working is happening at the wider level. The
focus groups held during the action phase of the research For the managers there are also some issues around the
confirmed this was an issue and a number of initiatives are role of management. At the wider level this is being taken
in place to encourage better cross-functional working and on board in the management development initiatives and
knowledge-sharing across the business. in identifying the appropriate behaviours and capabilities,

Shaping the Future final report 67

which are then being fed into the career development
process for managers.

What does the future look like?

There have been a number of initiatives taken as a direct
response to our phase 1 feedback. These are mostly in the
GDO Service Delivery team and the major initiatives are
around process re-engineering and the improvement of
management information. However, action has been taken
across the business to improve management capability and
two major changes, the acquisition of ACS and a new CEO,
are resulting both in a repositioning of the company and a
redefinition of performance.

The future is likely to hold some key challenges both in

terms of managing the economic situation and in getting
both the organisational design and culture correctly
positioned to manage the shift to a service-oriented
company and to enable a performance-driven culture.

68 Shaping the Future final report

Appendix 3:
Further sources of information

We have compiled a list of CIPD and other resources, under the eight themes from the research, that
you might find particularly interesting.

Alignment Shared purpose

Aligning Learning to the Needs of the Organisation Sustainable Organisation Performance: What really makes
Provides advice on aligning learning to organisational the difference?
priorities. Factsheet published February 2009. Interim report from the Shaping the Future project
reporting on the first phase of the work and putting
The Value of Learning forward a number of propositions to be tested in the
Considers the effectiveness of learning activities and how second phase of work. Published January 2010.
to assess its value to the organisation. Podcast released
August 2007. Shared Purpose: The golden thread?
This research shows that having a strong sense of
The Value of Learning: A new model of value and organisational purpose is linked with engagement,
evaluation satisfaction and sustainable business performance, and
Reports on a study – carried out for the CIPD by the that shared purpose is the ‘golden thread’ to which an
University of Portsmouth Business School – that looked organisation’s strategy should be aligned. Survey report
at the role of learning and training in creating value in published December 2010.
organisations and at how that role can be analysed,
measured and evaluated. Change Agenda published Shared Purpose and Sustainable Organisation Performance
April 2007. Discusses issues to stimulate thinking about the benefits of
creating a shared sense of purpose within organisations.
Aligning Learning to Strategic Priorities It is based on a literature review, CIPD survey findings
Helps learning and development professionals ensure that and includes a detailed illustrative case study of the RNLI.
organisational learning is aligned with strategic priorities. Research insight published September 2009.
Practical tool published November 2007.
Time for Change: Towards a next generation for HR
Performance Management: Podcast 25 Echoes of the importance of a shared sense of purpose
Philippa Lamb discusses performance management with are found in this report from the CIPD, emphasising the
Stephen Moir from Cambridgeshire County Council, importance of organisation authenticity. This is about
Stephen Sidebottom from banking giant, Nomura, and creating organisations that are the ‘same on the inside as
Michael Spiers from Sainsbury’s. the outside’ and where there’s consistency in the values
that are espoused and the way people operate in the
business. Research report published February 2010.

Shaping the Future final report 69

Leadership Locus of engagement

International Management Development: An overview Learning and the Line: The role of line managers in
Gives introductory guidance on the factors that affect an learning, training and development
organisation’s IMD strategy, the role of IMD in a talent Draws on the existing literature and on research
management and succession planning context and reviews undertaken in six organisations to examine:
various types of developmental opportunities. Factsheet • the practical meaning of training, learning and
published May 2010. development
• the supportive conditions necessary for effective line
International Management Development Guide management involvement
Examines international management development • the practical implications for managers.
(IMD) from the perspective of individual managers and Report published April 2007.
organisations. Guide published December 2005.
Harnessing the Power of Employee Communication
Engaging Leadership: Creating organisations that maximise Brings together CIPD research relating to employee
the potential of their people communication, gathers new perspectives and draws out
The first contribution to our Shaping the Future research a number of themes for HR practitioners and leaders at all
project explores the causal link between leadership and levels. Research insight published September 2010.
employee engagement. Report published September 2008.
HR: Taking employee communication seriously
Your first 100 days: A CIPD guide to management in the UK Complements the above research and sets out the
The first 100 days as a new leader are crucial in key steps for a strategic approach to communications.
determining success or failure – some pointers for Contains frameworks, diagnostics and activities to help
new ministers and other leaders in the new Coalition improve employee communication. Practical tool published
Government. Report published June 2010. September 2010.

Leadership and the Management of Conflict at Work Developing Positive Employee Relations
Findings of a CIPD/OPP survey into leadership and conflict Part 3 of the CIPD’s ‘Building Productive Public Sector
management in the workplace. Survey report published Workplaces’ series, also highlights the higher-stakes policy
October 2008. options the Government should be considering to protect
public services if there is an upsurge in industrial unrest.
UK Highlights: Global leadership forecast 2008–2009: the Report published August 2010.
typical, the elite and the forgotten
This survey report on the status of leadership and Creating an Engaged Workforce
leadership development within the UK business community Reports on a two-year research project from the Kingston
is produced jointly by the CIPD and Development Employee Engagement Consortium Project, analysing
Dimensions International (DDI). levels of engagement across eight different organisations.
It offers strategies for engagement and insights into the
outcomes of engagement. Report published January 2010.

An HR Director’s Guide to Employee Engagement

Aimed at senior HR professionals and others who are
considering an employee engagement framework as part
of their effective people management policies. Discussion
paper published June 2009.

70 Shaping the Future final report

Assessment and evaluation Balancing the short- and long-term horizons

Human Capital Evaluation: Getting started Organisational Responses to Economic Challenge

The first report from the CIPD Human Capital Panel Draws on a range of CIPD sources and others, where
examining the base data for human capital reporting. appropriate, to map the economic climate and the
Report published March 2006. organisational and employee responses to the challenges it
presents. Research insight published September 2009.
View from the City: How can human capital reporting
inform investment decisions? Reflections on Workforce Planning
Explores the human capital data valued by external A collection of essays looking at workforce planning from
investors. Research insight published December 2010. three different perspectives. Research insight published
November 2010.
Human Capital Reporting: What information counts in the City?
The objectives of the project were to examine the appetite Workforce Planning: Right people, right time, right skills
of the investment community for HCM reporting, to find Discusses having the people resource in place to deliver
out whether levels of interest have changed since previous short- and long-term objectives. Guide published June
work and to test the perceptions of investors and other 2010.
external stakeholders on a number of potential drivers of
sustainable performance identified by other CIPD research. Fighting Back through Talent Innovation: Talent
Report published December 2010. management under threat in uncertain times
Highlights the responses of ten organisations to the
Human Capital Evaluation: Developing performance challenges that the recession has brought to their talent
measures strategies. These organisations have found creative and
The third report from the CIPD Human Capital Panel innovative ways of rising and focusing on positive measures
summarises a panel discussion on the development of to tackle talent issues. Report published July 2009.
organisation-level performance indicators. Report published
July 2007.

Human Capital Evaluation: Evolving the data

The second report from the CIPD’s Human Capital Panel.
Contains guidance for generating robust and reliable data.
Report published October 2006.

Promoting the Value of Learning in Adversity

Provides practical tips to help promote the business case
for learning and development in your organisation. Guide
published April 2009.

Shaping the Future final report 71

Agility Capability-building

Approaches to Change: Building capability and confidence Coaching at the Sharp End: Developing and supporting the
Provides an introduction to the concepts and applications line manager as coach
of approaches to organisational change, drawing Designed for HR professionals and line managers to
on previous CIPD research and current thinking and improve focus and co-ordinate actions in developing and
including examples of practice from a range of case study sustaining a coaching culture. Practical tool published July
organisations. Practical tool published September 2010. 2009.

Managing People across Networks Building Leadership Capability for Change

Explores HR issues in organisations that are collaborating with Interview with Gary Hamel on how to build leadership
each other through outsourcing, contracting and working capability for change. Podcast released July 2009.
in partnership, when boundaries between employers can be
blurred. Discussion paper published April 2009.

Time for Change – Towards a Next Generation for HR

Echoes of the importance of a shared sense of purpose
are found in this report from the CIPD, emphasising the
importance of organisation authenticity. This is about
creating organisations that are the ‘same on the inside as
the outside’ and where there’s consistency in the values
that are espoused and the way people operate in the
business. Research report published February 2010.

72 Shaping the Future final report

Appendix 4:
References

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high-performance organization. Business Performance Management Review. Vol 44, No 2. pp65–70.
Management. February. pp24–30.
MAYRING, P. (2000) Qualitative Content Analysis
CHARTERED INSTITUTE OF PERSONNEL AND [28 paragraphs]. Forum Qualitative Sozialforschung /
DEVELOPMENT. (2010) Employee outlook: summer 2010. Forum: Qualitative Social Research [Online journal], 1(2).
Quarterly survey report. London: CIPD. http://www.qualitative-research.net/fqs-texte/2-00/2-
00mayring-e.htm [Accessed 16 June 2007].
CHARTERED INSTITUTE OF PERSONNEL AND
DEVELOPMENT. (2010) Workforce planning: right people, PFEFFER, J. and SUTTON, R.I. (2000) The knowing-doing
right time, right skills. Guide. London: CIPD. gap: how smart companies turn knowledge into action.
Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.
COLLINS, J. and PORRAS, J.I. (2005) Built to last: successful
habits of visionary companies. London: Random House YIN, R.K. (1990) Case study research: design and methods.
Business Books. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications.

DAMMANPOUR, F. and GOPALAKRISHNAN, S. (1998)

Theories of organizational structure and innovation
adoption. Journal of Engineering and Technology
Management. Vol 15, No1. pp1–24.

DIBELLA, A.J. (2007) Critical perceptions of organisational

change. Journal of Change Management. Vol 7, No 3–4.
pp231–242.

DOPSON, S., FITZGERALD, L. and FERLIE, E. (2008)

Understanding change and innovation in healthcare
settings: Reconceptualising the active role of context.
Journal of Change Management. Vol 8, No 3–4.
pp213–231.

EISENHARDT, K.M. (1989) Building theories from case study

research. The Academy of Management Review. Vol 14,
No 4. pp532–550.

FORD, R. (2008) Complex adaptive systems and

improvisation theory: Toward framing a model to enable
continuous change. Journal of Change Management.
Vol 8, No 3–4. pp173–198.

Shaping the Future final report 73

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