Will Lambeth ever get the HR Division it deserves?

I have been involved with major reorganisations in Lambeth for the last 21 years and have seen change after change. The HR division has been reinvented on more occasions and there have been more movements in that area than I have had visits to the toilet (apologies for the analogy)

The obsession, in my opinion, with this area of the Council is influenced by two major factors. First you have powerful predominantly male Directors who see HR as having a policing role which is something they do not like and they would prefer to have their own UDI' without having to answer to a Head of HR. These powerful empire building Directors resent the existence of HR and often try to control what HR does. The second factor that affects what happens in HR is the one around personalities and if the Head of HR happens to be weak then HR will often be pushed around. On the other hand and when the Head of HR is assertive or over the top with it there are constant wars between that section and front line Directors which then leads to an open war situation. This explains why HR in Lambeth has been centralised, then decentralised, only to be centralised and then be partially devolved. The difficulty and the product of this constant musical chairs movement comes from having a very weak HR team consisting of those who will either get fed up with the games and leave or have people who simply come in and do the minimum. That in turn produces a situation where new people are brought in with little or no experience of how the 'Levithan' works and they either get a major shock or simply put up and do the minimum.

So how can all this be challenged? Well the politicians should get more involved with this area of work and ensure that whoever is responsible for making the decisions they are aware of the strategic significance of this division. They are there to manage and deliver change and having a section full of people who are feeling insecure and unstable does not help deliver this aim? Either they do this or some of us who know a lot more about the organisation then most of the Chief Officers who have been recently appointed should start exposing this ridiculous situation (some of us know where all the skeletons are buried..) And why am I saying all these stuff right now? Because I can sense that we are about to get another reorganisation in HR pretty soon! Not right, not good and very destabilising. Get it right for God's sake!