Strategic direction

We help New Zealanders and their families to be independent and strong, and we target support to those who need it. We are focused on delivering results more effectively through our own services and alongside other government and non-government agencies.

Key opportunities and challenges

In the past the Ministry has usually handled only one major reform at a time. The environment we will operate in over the next four years sees us taking action across many decision areas of work. 

The top priorities for the Ministry are Welfare Reform, the Children’s Action Plan and Investing in Services for Outcomes (ISO) – alongside many other key initiatives across the Ministry’s work streams. 

Government has asked us for fundamental change to how we work, what we deliver and the way it is delivered – multiple changes, spanning the entire Ministry. To ensure we can achieve such a transformation our business strategy is built on: 

• collective leadership – within the Ministry and across the social sector, managing across portfolios
• a culture of action and responsibility
• strong relationship management using common goals
• strong risk management framework
• an ability to demonstrate progress and share our stories simply yet effectively.

Our programme of Welfare Reform is both large and complex. We have made good progress and will push on to embed the changes heralded in the Social Security (Benefit Categories and Work Focus) Amendment Bill 2. Central to the reform is an investment approach to welfare. This approach directs resource to where it can make the most impact to support people off long-term welfare dependence to independence. We will also maintain a safety net for those who need it. 

The Children’s Action Plan enacts New Zealand’s response to improving lives of vulnerable children. The Ministry leads many of the work streams. This work tests new forms of governance, strengthens Chief Executive accountability across agencies and has large scale impacts to the way we work. 

ISO transforms the way we interact with non-government organisations providing greater clarity of expectations and accountabilities. Ensuring the most effective purchase and delivery through our sector partners is integral to our other reforms. 

A strong Social Sector Forum of Sector Chief Executives is key to the successful achievement of Better Public Services. The Chief Executives have committed to delivering better results through innovation and a focus on rapid cycle change. Clear priorities such as Better Public Services Targets, the Social Sector Trials, Children’s Action Plan, Contracting and Christchurch, will demonstrate the efficacy of the Forum.

Data sharing is another major intersection with our social sector and public sector partners. Smart use of available intelligence, shared data and better information systems underpin our reforms. It will bring a step change to our ability to make resource decisions at every level of the Ministry. 

It is paramount that we have public trust and confidence in our ability to manage information responsibly. Better use of information is critical to our ability to progress each of the Government’s reform priorities. We must balance this with an operating environment that supports responsible and professional management of privacy and client information. During 2012 the Ministry suffered a high profile security breach. While independent reviews found that it was not a systemic problem, we now operate in an environment with a much greater awareness of the need for responsible and professional management of privacy and information security. Appropriate risk escalation, strong governance and the integration of information security into strategic planning will also be expected best practice while at the same time encouraging innovation. 

The Ministry is rapidly evolving towards new working practices as the environment around us changes. Increasingly the public are using technology to engage with us. It can be easier for them and is more cost-effective for us. We will make smart enterprise investment to ensure technology helps us to better reach and engage with our clients cost-effectively. This includes rolling out new self-service workstations across a range of Ministry sites. These workstations will run on a physically separate network from the Ministry’s and provide clients with a range of self-service features, such as allowing them to check their eligibility for financial assistance, apply online and search for work on a range of job sites. 

A major challenge for the Ministry is a fiscal one, on top of delivering Government’s key priorities. We have managed within our departmental budget since 2007 through a strong Value for Money approach. To address pressures, we have committed to a far reaching programme of business process re-engineering and information services developments to remove transactional processes and shift effort to where it can add value. These savings are built into the funding projections for our major reforms and our four year plan. 

We will continue to assess the staff capability mix to ensure we have the right people in the right places, as the Ministry changes to deliver reforms. We are also challenging ourselves to govern and manage better. We will ensure that we have the most appropriate leadership arrangements and understanding to meet our challenges into the future. 

We must keep the Ministry strong and agile to adapt to the level of change required through the reforms. It is vital that we take management and staff with us – to ensure that they know what is going on, remain committed and are resilient. Embedding our new purpose and principles is a key opportunity to reinforce who we are and what we want to achieve, together.