Corporate Strategy 2023-2028

Workforce

B3- We will enhance the development of our workforce, improving skills and opportunities as well as tackling issues of recruitment and retention

Self-assessment theme: Resource planning and management, Working with partners and customers.

Rationale

• Recruitment and retention of staff was a recurring theme in our self-assessment and a shortage of suitably skilled staff (a problem across the UK) is impacting on our ability to deliver some services.
• Our previous transformation programme contained actions around organisational culture. Whilst some of these actions are complete our recent staff survey shows that there is still work to do.
• We have committed to produce a workforce strategy, which is in the final stages of development. Several factors, such as our peripherality, the availability of housing and an aging workforce, means ‘grow your own’ solutions to labour shortages will play a greater part in workforce planning than in other authorities. This strategy will need to link to medium term financial planning.

What we are going to do

Adopt and implement our draft workforce plan.

• Continue to build career pathways aligned to Job Families.
• Create capacity and capability across our workforce.
• Create a Talent Pool through our SWiTCH project to embed agility into our organisation.
• Embed values and behaviour standards into our role profiles and recruitment.

Continue to invest in our Education workforce to achieve excellence via our Education workforce strategy.

• Utilise innovative recruitment approaches to promote working in Pembrokeshire and create clear career progression routes including providing pathways into leadership positions.
• Deliver high quality training and professional development at all levels, including non-teaching staff.
• Increase leadership capacity in the Local Authority by deploying and supporting leaders to lead across schools.

Develop our social care workforce through the SCCWDP partnership.

• Continue to develop social worker traineeships, building on our ‘grow your own’ approach to increasing numbers of social workers to meet demand.