27 May 2005
Sir Richard Mottram tells PFwhy the civil service now needs financial and other skills to progress
The generalist is dead – long live the generalist.
Much like the reign of monarchs, the career civil servant, in particular the cult of the gifted generalist, has been a defining element of British political culture. That might be brought to an end by the Cabinet Office's much-heralded reform of civil service training and skills.
Generations of talented, tireless, often self-trained and self-motivated bureaucrats have been the real driving force behind governments, providing independent policy and management consistency.
But critics of the generalist cult have long claimed that they have limited use in modern government because they often lack professional or specialist training.
Ed Straw, a partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers and author of the Demos think-tank's pamphlet, The dead generalist, argues that: 'The promotion of "gifted generalists" to the top of the civil service has meant that specialist and professional management skills are undervalued in government departments.'
The civil service policy of rotating senior staff from department to department, Straw adds, means that 'experience and specialist knowledge are often lost, and departments have poor "organisational memory" about what works and what doesn't.'
The Cabinet Office now agrees – to an extent. The Gershon and Lyons reviews have necessitated a radical overhaul of Whitehall skills, demanding from departments more efficient use of resources. Rightly or wrongly, there is a growing perception that the civil service needs to improve its IT, human resource management, procurement and finance skills.
So, in 2004, Cabinet secretary Sir Andrew Turnbull announced the Professional Skills for Government programme, kickstarting the assimilation of more professionals into the senior civil service. The reforms include plans to place professional financial managers in departments, including at board level.
The process is well advanced. Helen Kilpatrick, a CIPFA member, for example, recently moved to the Home Office as director of finance.
In an interview with Public Finance, Sir Richard Mottram, chair of the Civil Service Management Board task force, which created the PSG, and permanent secretary at the Department for Work and Pensions, said that 'professionalising' Whitehall's finance function was of 'paramount importance'.
Mottram said that his generation of mandarins had often quickly found themselves in charge of departments with thousands of staff, managing multibillion pound budgets, but without detailed professional understanding of finance (or other specialist roles). 'Now, we must have project managers who can manage, and finance experts who can manage some of the biggest budgets in the country,' he said.
To aid the finance initiative, CIPFA has set up a diploma course in public finance and leadership in partnership with Warwick Business School. This aims to help civil servants to achieve chartered accountant status in under two years.
Similar programmes have either been set up, or are planned, to train specialists in IT, procurement, public service law and policy formulation.
But does the new system really mark the end of the generalist? The PSG divides civil service jobs into one of three groups: policy expert/analyst, corporate services (eg, finance and HR) and operational delivery (project managers, lawyers, those involved in frontline delivery).
To rise into the senior civil service, however, individuals must have experience in more than one job grouping.
Mottram told PF: 'We're not asking candidates for senior posts to have equal weighting in each field. We want people to start off with a specialism, but they must develop skills in other areas.
'In the DWP, for example, we have people that develop policy. But to reach the highest levels, you will have to have experience of delivering policy on the ground. You need a breadth of understanding across the whole organisation.'
He believes this would also help prevent Whitehall from being overrun by the 'policy zealots' that FDA general secretary Jonathan Baume has warned against.
Baume believes the Cabinet Office must prevent specialists turning into 'personal proselytisers for a particular policy' (or government) by enshrining the tradition of civil service independence.
Sir David Normington, permanent secretary at the Department for Education and Skills, also believes that continued independence is vital to the PSG project. But he fears a bigger, structural threat. 'We must ensure that PSG initiates lasting benefits and doesn't just become another layer of bureaucracy,' he said.
Perhaps the biggest challenge, Mottram believes, will be full implementation of the PSG within existing departmental budgets – there is no additional cash set aside for the project.
That will test the skills of Whitehall's new finance specialists. But accountants need skills in more than one field before they can take their place at Whitehall's top table.
The generalist is dead – long live the qualified generalist.
PFmay2005
