Technology Careers in Housing

To underpin long-term sustainability, support growth and build resilience against an increasingly difficult operating environment, Thrive Homes has implemented a game-changing transformation of their service model in partnership with Campbell Tickell. The case for change started with a desire to create a service model that engenders self-reliance, improves services and reduces costs. And a model which explores what could be learned from commercial service provision. In defining the case for change the Thrive Board and Executive recognised that only a full system change would deliver the necessary scale of transformation within the timescale required. The target service model is of low-cost housing provision where rental income provides great value via low-touch digital access for the majority of customer interactions, with staff resources increasingly focused on carefully targeted sustainment and intervention offers. A reset in the relationship with customers is required to create new mutual expectations and address the negative behaviours that drive-up costs.  This reset requires fresh thinking about how the relationship with customers is framed with extensive changes to what customers see and experience as part of a demand reduction strategy. It is equally important to consider organisational design and cultural and behavioural change. Whilst this scale and interdependency of the changes obviously represented a high degree of risk to the organisation, there was a recognition that only by building a new service model from the ground up could the greatest benefits for customers and Thrive be realised. From a Blueprint prepared by CT consultants working within the organisation, and endorsed by the Thrive Board in July 2016, a programme of transformation is already realising the vision: The Thrive Deal: A concise set of Offer and Ask statements replace layers of policy, handbooks and leaflets, and are explicit in setting out the meaning of tenancy terms and conditions, whist also straightforwardly demonstrating compliance with consumer standards.  These Offer and Ask statements redress the balance of tenant responsibilities and demand on the service, by, for example, making clear that tenants must resolve low-level ASB issues such as noise nuisance, and by clarifying the range of repairs that are the responsibility of the customer. A set of charges are applied for delivering services that fall outside the core offer or are the tenant’s responsibility and for recovering the costs of rectification work. A straightforward customer journey mapping approach, led by staff, translates the Offer and Ask statements into new business processes. Going Digital: Improving on a previous low-level digital presence, customers can book and manage appointments directly for a range of Easyfix repairs (potentially 40% of demand) through the myThrive App. New customer sign-up will be managed through a bespoke self-service portal, with an application gateway that requires nominees to submit proof of identity and affordability, and an induction gateway that ensures they are fully aware of their responsibilities as tenants. In this way the expectations of new customers are actively shaped beginning with the first point of contact. Scheduling the work of all field teams through the mobile working platform, combined with multiskilling (inspections) will enable the deployment of a flexible and efficient ’call-off’ style delivery model. Further improvements to service and reductions in cost-to-serve are planned as our model matures. Home Plan: puts the customer centre stage in the management of their home. From undertaking simple repairs to understanding what constitutes careless damage, a refreshed Home Standard manages the expectations of new customers. Using photographic inventory management, adopted from the private sector, and being piloted with new customers, over a period all customers will be on a rolling four-year cycle of inspections (aligning with an 8-year fixed-term tenancy cycle for new customers). This evidence-based approach will inform both component renewal decisions and tenancy interventions and will shape customer expectations of the service. Organisational Design: A bold and simplified staffing structure was required to best support the profound changes in service delivery mechanisms. This simpler model maximises empowerment at all levels and supports the new approach to customer journeys. A programme of cultural change supports adaptation to new ways of working and responds to new levels of expectation. Roles are more generic, generating savings from the greater flexibility this provides. Thrive has already realised an 18% reduction in headcount and year on year savings of £247k from the new model and will deliver further savings arising from operational efficiencies and reducing demand. The approach is scalable and so responds well to growth opportunities. Measuring what Matters: Thrive has radically simplified the way it measures its effectiveness and customer contentment, gone are the how quickly did we do it type measures, that create perverse incentives and restrict customer choice, replaced with measuring a choose the time that suites you and we will get the job done approach. In measuring contentment, customers are simply asked “was the service you received – good or not good enough?” Realisation and Outcomes: The Thrive Deal business case defines a target operational model with associated return on investment and performance outcomes. Thrive will fully realise this vision over the next three years and a Value Realisation Framework ensures the Board can track outcomes. By transforming in totality its offer to customers and what it asks in return, its delivery model and organisational design, Thrive Homes is now positioned to sustain itself, grow quickly, and meet the ongoing challenges of the operating environment. Whilst the outcomes are tailored to Thrive Homes, the Blueprint for this approach is transferable and could work for others. What lessons did we learn along the way? The importance of: Commitment on what is inevitably a very demanding journey The value of a trusting, collaborative relationship between client and consultants that enables ambitious ideas to become reality Flexibility on the journey when things don’t work as originally envisaged Securing and maintaining Board support and strategic leadership to take the bold steps, in full understanding of the benefits and risks. Authors: Elspeth Mackenzie, Chief Executive, Thrive Homes ; Alistair Sharpe-Neal, Associate, Campbell Tickell and Jon Slade, Senior Consultant, Campbell Tickell https://www.campbelltickell.com/ http://www.thrivehomes.org.uk/

The housing sector is undergoing significant changes, having to develop new solutions for housing and homelessness issues, catering for the regulatory and welfare reforms, managing demand which is greater than supply and now emergency health and safety reviews. These challenges are having a direct impact on traditional operating procedures. When solving these issues, the housing sector relies on a highly-talented workforce to identify the problems, assess their impacts, and design new operating practices, create solid project plans and deliver change. HR plays a pivotal role in managing talent, engaging the workforce and running the talent supply. In order to carry out their day-to-day role, HR teams typically rely on sophisticated systems to handle much of the drudgery, such as transactions, calculations, alerts, approvals and reporting, so they’re free to focus on the areas that add real value. But ask your HR team if they feel supported and have enough time to carry out the workload they have been tasked with, the answer is almost certain to be a resounding “No!”. So what went wrong and how can you fix it? When you and your colleagues went through the procurement process, you carefully assessed the capabilities of different HR systems and selected the solution that was most aligned to your current and future business requirements. Clever HR systems are a reality, they do exist, and they are capable of taking the pain out of your job. However, by the time you get to week one of your implementation, your product knowledge is usually out of date. These systems are clever because they are in continuous development. When you go through an implementation of a new HR system, you design the build with everything you need in order to go live. All those additional benefits you are going to gain, all those new features you saw in demonstrations, you get to apply them, click your fingers and make your life easier. Well, it’s not quite that simple. It’s a long and challenging process. Think back to the end of your last implementation; how many other things had you planned to adopt after go live, yet how many of those did you actually achieve? The fact is that life gets in the way; we are all very busy people. After an exhausting implementation, when you get to go live, your HR team deserves a period of ‘back to normal’ but the demands of HR and payroll never disappear. Instead of training, your team is back to the grind. The HR team will have to discover the new functionality, they will also have to embed the new processes and support organisation-wide changes. In addition, your system supplier will also release new functionalities, often several times a year. Some organisations will employ a system administrator who is dedicated to continuing the configuration and roll-out of the system’s new features. Others will create ‘super users’ within HR and payroll who are upskilled to be able to configure new features. So why aren’t you fully benefiting from your HR system? There are three common causes: Since the last recession, we have seen a decline in system administrator roles. This may have fixed a short-term budget problem but it’s consequently costing organisations money because they are not maximising their return on investment. Super users are brilliant but they’re already in a full-time role and have implemented many changes over recent years (such as legislation reform, pension changes, talent management, employee engagement and handling data). When do these super users get the time to review new system features and implement them? The answer is that they don’t. People leave organisations for all sorts of reasons. It’s an unfortunate reality that you lose system expertise through attrition. That knowledge is often lost, either through inability or through organisational unwillingness. Do organisations stop evolving because they have lost HR system knowledge or because super users have busy workloads? Of course not; they can’t. They must change to sustain revenue targets and growth. What happens when changes affect your workforce? Changes come thick and fast; terms and conditions, new ways of calculating pay, new pension rules and so on. They are not optional and they all require their implementation by strict deadlines. If you don’t have the system expertise to configure the changes in your HR system, the HR team will end up manually processing the changes outside your system. Now you are in the dreaded ‘chicken and egg’ HR management situation. Your job is even busier because you are managing the employee-related changes manually, reducing the time available to configure your clever HR system to automate the processing for you. As you are processing manually, you also need to add further checks to eliminate any risk of human error. This becomes a vicious circle. When you selected your HR system, how many functional requirements did you identify – 50, 100, 200, or more? And how many supporting services requirements did you identify – 10, 15, 20? So how do you get the best from your HR system? If employing a dedicated system administrator or a super user with ring-fenced admin time isn’t commercially viable, here are two ways to solve your problem: Invest in an internal upgrade process. Bring together representatives from HR, recruitment, learning and development, payroll, and people managers. Give them time to review the release documentation then meet up and agree a combined approach. Secure resources and build your implementation plan while making sure you allocate a realistic amount of time to the configuration. You may need internal communications to reach all of your colleagues, make sure everyone knows what is happening, when, why and how this affects them. Talk to your software supplier. They can provide HR and payroll industry experts who will help you to get the most out of your system and work with you to introduce best practice, building operationally efficient processing, saving you time and improving accuracy. The chicken and egg HR management situation can be resolved, but it takes self-reflection, determination and clarity of purpose. Author: Julie Lock is the service development director at MHR. https://www.mhr.co.uk/

Welcome to Housing Technology Insights. We are delighted to announce that we are going to be sharing content on this platform which we feel will continue to support and add value to your careers in housing. This is part of our ongoing goal of helping our readers find the right IT jobs in housing and succeed within housing associations and local authorities. These insights will discuss recruitment, skills and careers relating to technology professionals within our sector. We hope you find this a rich source of information over the coming months. Please stay tuned for the latest articles!   We welcome relevant submissions and If you'd like to contribute to our Insights section, please get in touch via news@housing-technology.com.