I’ve been looking at how we engage staff across the council and give you all the chance to have your say. There are a number of communications channels such as this blog, team meetings, Staffnet etc. Some things work well but some lack evidence as to how well they are working. We also have a staff survey which was last run in 2021 and helped shaped our Workforce and Agile strategies, based on what staff told us. However, the survey doesn’t always have a great response rate so I discussed with our staff engagement group how we can generate more interest so that more staff have their say. It was good to hear ideas from the group who represent services across the council. We agreed the traditional staff survey doesn’t work for everyone and we need to consider a range of options such as focus groups and holding events where staff can come along and put their views forward. We also need to consider how we use technology and the likes of Teams to bring many people together, although we also need to think about how we involve those who don’t use laptops during their working day. I’ll be working with colleagues to put a plan in place and update you, but please let me have any thoughts directly.
The group also discussed the ongoing work on the council’s culture and our behaviours and values. We want to create a small set of values which are simple to understand and give our staff a clear view of what’s expected of us all. This can then be followed through in staff appraisals and team discussions.
We’re a month on from declaring Swansea as Wales’ first Human Rights City. It’s a great accolade but it’ll mean nothing if we and other organisations across Swansea don’t change the way we work and consider people’s human rights. Our priorities are: tackling poverty, vulnerable children and families, tackling discrimination, domestic violence and abuse and human rights awareness. We’re now working with organisations to ensure we all consider human rights when drafting polices and planning services. With the help of Swansea University we’ve provided a guide on how organisations can implement a human rights approach to what they do. There are pocket guides available to give a brief summary of human rights and how we can all help to promote people’s rights. Further information is here.
We’re holding our annual Holocaust Memorial Day event today and it’s great to see a number of our schools are taking part. It’s so important we continue to remember the holocaust as well as modern-day suffering and there’s a clear link to our human rights approach. I’m grateful to our cross-service team who planned the event and to the schools and external groups who are taking part.
Following the recent positive Estyn inspection of our education services, education director Helen Morgan Rees brought the education quarterly update to CMT on the issues facing the directorate and our schools. Thanks to everyone in the department and our schools for their continued work. The planned school strikes are likely to bring disruption and may affect our staff with childcare issues. I’m hoping the flexible working arrangements we introduced during the pandemic will allow staff and managers to plan opportunities for staff to work.
