Dear Colleague

LOCAL DEVELOPMENT TEAMS AND ORGANISATION DEVELOPMENT NEEDS ANALYSIS

Summary

1.   The establishment of Local Development Teams in each Health Board Area, Special Health Board, is designed as a supportive process to ensure local ownership and control over the development agenda. The intention is that each of these teams will be able to maximise and focus local development effort, with support from central resources, to achieve the objectives detailed in local modernisation plans.

2.    The teams, which should be constituted in a way that reflects the needs of the organisations involved, should be able to use the various analysis tools to develop a corporate view of where organisations have got to, in relation to the national agenda and to jointly plan how their identified development needs can best be met.

3.    The attached supporting paper identifies some of the key people who may need to be involved, but there is no prescription around membership of the Local Development Team and variations both between teams and overtime will be appropriate according to the local situation.

4.    The Organisation Development Needs Analysis process detailed in the attached papers is designed to enable Local Development Teams to take a structured and balanced view of their current position in relation to the modernisation agenda. This stock take exercise, which contains significant areas of flexibility for local tailoring, will provide a sound baseline for development planning and any subsequent evaluation of development activities.

Chief Executives, NHS Trusts

General Manager, State Hospital

General Managers, Special Health Boards

General Manager, Common Services Agency

For information
Human Resources Directors, NHS Trusts

Human Resource Directors, Health Boards

Human Resource Directors, Special Health Boards

LHCC Leads

Auditor General, Audit Scotland

____________________________

Enquiries to:

Zoe van Zwanenberg
Head of Development
Strategic Change Unit
Room 146
St Andrew’s House
EDINBURGH EH1 3DG

Tel: 0131-244 2444
Fax: 0131-244 2387
E-Mail: kirsteen.macleod@scotland.gov.uk
_____________________

Electronic copies of the OD Needs Analysis Questionnaire are available on request from Kirsteen Macleod on the above number

• The analysis will also enable the Local Development teams to give clear position statements to the Modernisation Board about both their current state, future plans and progress.
  
  
• The analysis activity has been designed to supplement and support work already in hand and will be a useful adjustment to new developments in local and national performance management systems.

Guidance

The attached guidance sets out the purpose and suggested membership of the Local Development Teams, the relationship with the Modernisation Board, the support which will be given by the Strategic Change Unit and the outline process from which each Local Development Team should draw its customised analysis programme.

Action

Health Boards and Trusts should plan to have established the membership and remit of their Local Development Team by the end of July 2000. These Teams should aim to complete their plans for implementing their analysis programme by the end of September with the main body of the analysis programme and its subsequent action plans being in place by the end of February 2001.

In summary Local Development Teams should:

• have established their analysis programme plan by end September 2000;
  
  
• have completed the main body of their analysis programme by end December 2000;
  
  
• have agreed their development action plan by end February 2001.

Yours sincerely

GERRY MARR
Director Of Human Resources

LOCAL DEVELOPMENT TEAMS, MODERNISATION AND ORGANISATION DEVELOPMENT NEEDS ANALYSIS

Introduction

This guidance supports a structured and service driven approach to organisation development. It is based on the policy imperatives of 'Designed to Care' and 'Towards a Healthier Scotland', the 'Programme for Government' and the subsequent modernisation programme. It builds on the work already in progress in all Boards and Trusts and supports a corporate approach to delivery of the strategic objectives given in the key policy documents.

Local Development Teams

These teams should bring together senior staff who are involved in driving the modernisation agenda from the Health Board and Trusts in each Mainland Health Board area. The Island Boards and Special Health Boards should establish their local teams from key staff and partners relevant to their modernisation programme. If the team is not drawn from the General Manager, Chief Executive or HR Directors then they should ensure that the membership of the team has both the appropriate strategic perspectives on the development needs of the area and the delegated authority to make decisions and commit resources to the development agenda.

It is suggested that Teams should include the individual who is the named lead person for implementing the Education, Training and Life Long Learning Strategy to ensure that work is not duplicated between different development activities. Consideration should also be given to involving individuals from the local partnership forum, LHCC's and external partner organisations to support a 'whole systems' approach to both the analysis and subsequent development plans.

The Team should be focused on matching organisational development activity to the strategic priorities defined in the agreed modernisation programme, corporate contract, the HIP and TIPs. This will not necessarily mean new activity but the co-ordination of existing work and the sharing of learning across the organisations.

The Local Development team will be supported by a member of the Strategic Change Unit, who will give support to the Organisation Development Needs Analysis process, give advice on designing and commissioning development interventions and ensure that learning from other Health Board areas is brought to the attention of the team. This individual will have details of the consultants available to undertake the analysis and development work through the framework contracts established with the Strategic Change Unit. They will attend the consultants network meetings and the NHSiS Organisation Development Learning Network. These two networks have been established to support shared learning across the NHS in Scotland.

The Local Development Team should ensure that their shared organisation development plans are integral to the learning plans being established in response to the Education, Training and Lifelong Learning Strategy.

The Modernisation Board and National Reference Group for the Strategic Change Unit will both review the impact of this process and advise the Unit on what national development activities should be given priority. The feedback from the process will give the Modernisation Board robust information on which to base further developments and shared learning.

Organisation Development Needs Analysis

(the PDF full version of this document can be viewed by clicking here. This document is in Adobe Acrobat format. Click here if you need to download the latest Acrobat reader)

The Organisation Development Needs Analysis is designed to enable Local Development Teams and their respective organisation’s Boards, Executive Teams and LHCC Management Teams to take a structured view of their current state in respect of defined variables. The ‘tools’ have been developed on the basis of well-researched organisation development models and theories. The details of these are given in the supporting documentation provided Appendix 3.

The initial analysis will be a stock-take exercise, which may be used in conjunction with other methodologies such as EFQM to provide a baseline for future evaluation. It also provides the opportunity for a Trust or Health Board area to benchmark with other parts of the NHSiS on the whole of the analysis or discrete parts which are of particular concern.

Local Development Teams should develop a project plan to deploy both the self-assessment tools, and then subsequently the Organisation Development Needs Analysis structured interview process. The policy probes are available for use after this initial work has been completed.

There are 4 parts to the overall process:

1. The self assessment tool is designed for use with teams. It should be completed by each member of the team and the results then compared to establish where there are differences in view and where some exploration and/or development is required. It is for the Local Development Team and/or each Board or Trust to decide how far into the organisation they wish to deploy the self assessment tool. It is recommended that both executives and non-executives on the Board complete the questionnaire and debate the results and their implications and that this is extended to Divisional Teams and LHCC Management Groups.
   
   
2. The pre-interview questionnaire may be completed by either a named individual or a team. As a team exercise it would provide the opportunity to explore commonalities and differences in view. The sections reflect the critical elements of national policy and may be used to focus the probing debate of the other parts of the process.
   
   
3. The structured interviews should be conducted by an external consultant taken from the Strategic Change Unit framework contract. The Local Development Team should decide who they wish to work with, but the consultant costs for the work will be met by the Strategic Change Unit. The structured interview is expected to take 2/3 hours, and again Local Development Teams should decide whether this is to be an individuals or team event and which individual teams should be involved. The interviewer will use the information gathered from the pre-interview questionnaire to ensure they are working from an informed base and are able to probe areas which appear unclear or problematic. The Local Development Team may wish to sample views on particular aspects either with clinical or LHCC teams. Local Development Teams are encouraged to seek views from partner organisations to give a more rounded perspective on their current state. They should decide who they wish to involve and over what time frame.
   
   
4. The policy probe tool is for each organisation to deploy as required. It gives a structured approach to testing out how far policy initiatives are being deployed in practice. It is suggested that each organisation chooses 2 policy areas to probe, one which they regard as successful and one which is encountering difficulties. The focus group work on what "helps and hinders" will then enable an organisation to learn from its own practice in achieving change by identifying barriers and methods of overcoming them that they already have experience of. This will support organisations in developing their own learning histories - a key characteristic of a "learning organisation".

Analysis Reports and Development Plans

Local Development Teams should send a copy of their outline project plan for the analysis process to the Strategic Change Unit for information.

The corporate self assessment tool can be analysed locally, for which a template will be provided by the Strategic Change Unit. Alternatively, the Strategic Change Unit could undertake the data analysis for a Local Development Team, in which case all the data and the report will be returned to the local team.

The Modernisation Board and the Strategic Change Unit Reference Group will require a report on the main OD analysis, taking account of the responses to the pre-interview questionnaire and the structured interview. This report should highlight:

1.   Key Facts on Modernisation

• Local development on governance and leadership.
  
  
• Services being re-designed and expected outcomes.
  
  
• Policy development and public involvement.

2.    Areas of good practice in development and learning which could be shared across the service.

3.    Areas of concern where national support in terms of development activity, information or collaboration would assist local development.

The Local Development Team should also send a copy of their action plan to the Strategic Change Unit. The Unit's reference group will then review the plans highlighting their needs for national support in terms of funding or development activity with a view to identifying the priorities for national development which should be undertaken by the Unit.

Modernisation Board

The Board will be looking to learn from the analysis process what is going well and what additional support may be required to deliver the Government's modernisation plans.

Strategic Change Unit Support

The Strategic Change Unit will identify named individuals to support each Local Development Team. They will have access to the central Organisation Development Framework Contract, from which Consultant support can be drawn for both the analysis process and subsequent development activity. The SCU will also give financial support by paying for consultant time for the analysis and by joint funding agreed development priorities.