A public service review has produced a vision of aspirational leadership, focusing staff and community behind a common endeavour to provide unity of outcome though diversity of delivery. The ultimate goal is world class performance. Although this sounds very familiar with language well used in Whitehall and town halls, it is actually about the Falkland Island.

The Islands have an extensive and monolithic public sector which is very different from the situation in the UK. The review showed that Government lacked a sufficiently clear big picture that links policy aims and resources. A range of People Management issues were raised by staff and managers, including lack of workforce planning, career development and skills development.

The review also revealed a need for a new organisational structure to facilitate strategic and corporate working and career development. Staff did not feel empowered to improve the experience for the customer or have their voice heard. Managers felt strongly that there could be unrealistic expectations of such a small and diverse organisation.

The Review was carried out by the Chief Executive, Dr Tim Thorogood, a former chief executive of Swansea City and County Council. The outcome is expected to be a reduction in the on-going costs of government of £200,000 per year after four years. This will be achieved by providing a smaller top management team, devolving day to day management to a new second tier of Heads of Service, strengthening the government’s ability to reduce costs, progressing privatisation and improving the ability of related services to work together by grouping them logically under a single director.