Targeted youth support: Ensuring that leadership supports integration of services
Contact
| Provider | Training and Development Agency |
|---|---|
| Topics | Targeted youth support |
| Type | Emerging practice |
| Date | February 2007 |
| Region | London |
Overview
One of the critical questions identified in the Discover stage of the targeted youth support (TYS) change process in Southwark was how to ensure leadership supports integration and is felt at the frontline. The senior management group, led by the director of children's services, decided to work in their own change team to explore this issue.
Action taken
A workshop was designed to address the critical question. In the meantime, the objective of the workshop became more complicated as the senior management team decided to implement a matrix management structure. The final objective of the workshop was how to make the multi-agency and matrix vision operational through:
- Developing distributed leadership among service and team managers
- Establishing common messages and communication tools
- Developing appropriate competencies and behaviours
- Reviewing the deployment of the workforce
- Establishing appropriate systems and procedures
The workshop gave the senior group space to stand back and begin to think about these issues objectively. The authority's greatest resource in making the change successful is its workforce, so the workshop explored
- Barriers to mobilising the workforce
- The challenge of matrix management
- What is needed from the workforce in this new environment and what the levers of change might be
Results
Addressing vision and leadership in this way enabled the senior group to check that their different services had a shared understanding and vision for the future. They also did some practical work on the skills needed for matrix and multi-agency management.
Finally, they thought afresh about the risks that might derail the change process and how to ensure success. They checked the existing action plan against the rational, political and emotional barriers to mobilising the workforce and against the levers for change they had identified.
Click to go back to the process case studies for the Develop stage.
Email this resource to a colleague.
Targeted youth support: Ensuring that leadership supports integration of services
