Organisational health and capability

Over the next four years the Ministry is undertaking initiatives to strengthen its organisational culture and capability by improving corporate capability and building a constructive culture and leadership style.

The next four years

Many of the Ministry’s initiatives have been about maximising its existing capacity and capabilities to deliver better services for clients and creating more opportunities for collaboration and innovation. However, we are also building the foundations to ensure the Ministry is fit for purpose in the future. We have identified specific skills we need to develop, including case management and leadership skills. Programmes and a strategic direction have been put in place to address these deficiencies.

As well as a focus on capability building, there has also been a focus on organisational health. We need to ensure we can manage the demands a large programme of change will have on our people and organisation.

Building a constructive culture

Culture underpins everything we do at the Ministry and impacts on our organisational and individual resilience. It helps us to create a supportive environment to learn, develop and work, improve our performance and provide better services to our clients. A focus on culture will add value to our staff, our work teams and our organisation.

In recognition of this we have put in place a significant culture development programme, Building Blue, across the Ministry. The programme supports the values we need to encourage: an outward focus, collaboration, client-centricity and innovation. Blue reflects those characteristics that we want to demonstrate, encourage and increase. Red and green represent characteristics that may need to exist to perform certain roles, but that as an organisation we want to minimise not encourage. These include passive, defensive and aggressive behaviour.

We have been implementing this programme since 2012/2013 and progress will continue over the next 10 years to make a sustainable difference.

Some of the key behaviours we are looking to embed are:

• helping others fulfil their potential
• accepting and sharing responsibility
• seeking to improve things
• building strong relationships
• being flexible and open to change
• accepting and believing in ourselves and others.

Equal employment opportunities

The Ministry’s equal employment opportunities (EEO) policy is supported by a commitment to promote equality and diversity within a positive work culture that is based on respect, fairness and valuing individual difference.

The 2013 Human Rights Commission EEO Survey identified that the Ministry’s EEO policies and practices have led to positive outcomes for Māori employees. The aim is to continue with these practices and to become an exemplar employer of disabled people.

To become an exemplar, the Ministry is removing barriers so that disabled employees can be integrated into all parts of the Ministry, contributing to their full potential and supporting the Ministry to achieve its outcomes. As an exemplar, we would set the standards for other agencies to follow.

Over the next four years the Ministry will aim to:

• identify organisational barriers to involvement, and minimise or remove these; we will set up a disability network/advisory group to help with this
• ensure our accommodation is appropriate and accessible as well as updating our accommodation guidelines and processes
• provide disability awareness training and resources through a variety of channels
• provide education and communication to ensure managers and staff are ‘disability confident’
• work with other agencies to share best practice and aim for our policies and procedures to be an exemplar for the sector.

Maintaining stable industrial relations

We know that positive and stable industrial relations support a high-performing organisation.

All five of our collective agreements will come up for renewal over the course of 2015 and 2016. These agreements will continue to provide a stable platform for the Ministry as we embed government initiatives for better public services and other programmes that will change the way we work.

As our operating model changes to meet new expectations, and we work through the renewals of collective agreements, we will seek to maintain a constructive relationship with the unions that represent Ministry employees, the largest of which is the Public Service Association (PSA). The Ministry’s Modern and Productive Public Services Agreement with the PSA outlines a shared commitment to work together on innovation, productivity and value for money.

Managing risk

The rise in demand for services presents an ongoing challenge for the Ministry to manage its risks and operate within existing baselines. Risk management is integrated into our daily decisions and actions. Strategic risks are managed by our Leadership Team. We are working internally to make decisions in a risk aware way and build in consideration of risk early in every process.

The Ministry’s Risk and Assurance Group advises the Chief Executive and Leadership Team on the systems, processes and controls that the Ministry relies on to deliver effective and efficient services to all New Zealanders. Each year the Group undertakes a programme of audit, assurance, risk and advisory activity to improve risk management processes across the organisation. An independent Risk and Audit Committee provides expert risk advice directly to the Chief Executive.

Below is a summary of the key risks and opportunities that may affect our ability to perform and deliver on our strategic direction over the next four-year period and how these are being mitigated.