Issue - meetings

The Report is attached.

Martin Lewis (Re-Enabling Services Manager) introduced the item and began by explaining the system of agile working and new methods of working had begun to be re-examined 18 months ago. The Covid pandemic had then hit and this was used as an additional opportunity to trial new ways of working and broaden the scope of the Estates Masterplan. The programme had been run since July and had provided important information in terms of how teams wanted to work, and how to embed cultural and behavioural changes. Martin Lewis said the first stage of the Estates Masterplan would focus on Shire Hall and a pilot scheme would be introduced here first before looking at how the proposals would affect other office spaces. Simon Lewis (Strategy and Commissioning Manager, Property Management) said the dynamics of different teams would change how the office buildings were used. It was important to understand how teams wanted to use the buildings before any cultural changes were implemented. The Chair said he was pleased that consideration was being given to how staff wanted to work, as this was an important point in terms of the Masterplan.

Councillor Boad said she was surprised the number of staff wanting to return to the office was low, as compared to a year ago a significant number of staff had expressed a preference for wanting to return to office working. She asked if any trends had been identified from different teams. She gave the example of social workers being an appropriate team to have located together as it was a team that could benefit from collaborative working, particularly in light of recent tragic cases that had been covered in the national media. She added some staff members may have missed the spontaneity of having one to one catch ups with colleagues. Martin Lewis said different teams were identified to test different ways of working, and in teams where a preference for home working had been identified then they had been supplied with the technology to allow them to do this.

Responding to a question from Councillor Tromans, Martin Lewis said collaborations meant different things to different teams. For example some teams would regard face to face meetings to discuss a confidential matter as collaborative whereas others would use technology to hold a hybrid meeting and consider that as collaborative. Simon Lewis added that workspace utilisation would vary from team to team; in some cases, 40 per cent of spaces being used might be appropriate whereas in other teams, such as in the call centre, 100 per cent utilisation would be anticipated. It was possible for a workspace to have more than 100 per cent utilisation if more than one person used it on any given day.

Rob Powell said there had been variations in the number of people coming into the office. Prior to the recent implementation of Plan B, numbers had been starting to increase. Rob Powell said each team had set its own agile working principles, and noting  ...  view the full minutes text for item 6