Annex 2
EXAMPLE OF
CROSS-CUTTING
TEAM
The Structural Issues Team aims to ensure that
the Treasury's microeconomic policies support the macroeconomic
objective of raising the long term sustainable rate of growth.
It is centred in the Macroeconomic Policy Directorate, but brings
in people at a variety of levels from Public Services, Budget
and Public Finances and Financial Regulation and Industry Directorates.
As well as drawing on longer-term research the team contribute
directly to the policy agenda and key documents such as the Budget
and pre-Budget report.
4.4 These methods of working mean we need
to employ high-calibre staff; to develop them quickly; and to
treat them as a prized asset. To deliver this:
— We recruit policy analysts and professionals
through the civil service wide "fast stream" competition.
This year, for the first time, we are also undertaking a direct
graduate recruitment campaign. Other staff are also recruited
directly.
— We have a development programme offering
our staff extensive training in the core skills which we require.
Most training is provided by external suppliers.
— We encourage our staff to get experience
of other work through outward secondments and other means. At
any time we have about 135 people on loan or secondment to other
employers.
— The Treasury was last year accredited
as an Investor in People (IiP). We aim to maintain and improve
our performance in this area. We are also issuing to all of our
staff a "Career Deal" designed to demonstrate the prospects
which the Treasury offers to all its employees.
4.5 To increase our breadth of expertise
and range of perspectives we are increasingly employing people
from elsewhere in the economy. Since 1999 the Treasury Management
Board has included a non-executive director, whose background
is as a senior management consultant specialising in the management
of change and human resource issues. We have a long record of
taking staff on loan from other Government Departments, and we
are increasingly taking secondees from other employers—including
some overseas governments. Some posts—including some at
senior level—are advertised to external applicants. Most
recently we have appointed the former Chief Operating Officer
of BAe Systems as Chief Executive of the Office of Government
Commerce, and our two new Deputy Directors in the Public Service
Directorate were formerly Chief Executive of Bristol City Council
and the Director of Macroeconomic Forecasting and Policy in the
New Zealand Treasury.
4.6 For the same reason we need to increase
the diversity of the organisation. Our staffing is at present
not truly representative of the diversity of the UK population:
to that extent we are not maximising its effectiveness. We are
preparing an action plan of measures to remedy this.
4.7 As well as reflecting the Treasury's
business needs, many of the developments described in the preceding
sections are closely related to the Modernising Government and
Civil Service Reform initiatives. Annexes 3 and 4 summarise the
main themes of those initiatives and the actions which the Treasury
is taking to implement them.
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