Agenda item

To consider and comment upon the progress of the Improvement Plan and the Risk Register up to 2 February 2023.

An update was provided to the Committee on progress made against the improvement plan.

Significant progress had continued to be made to deliver the actions within the Improvement Plan. This included the completion of the Phase 1 Governance Review with changes to the Constitution agreed, preparations for the new Chief Executive taking up post on 6 February, approval of the Medium Term Financial Strategy and the completion of the reviews of the Serco and Sandwell Children’s Trust (SCT) contracts.

A summary of the current risks and slippages were delivered to the Committee. The Workforce Strategy had experienced slippage from the original delivery date of March 2023; the new target date was May 2023. It was expected that the “One Team Framework” would be approved in March 2023.

Regarding Corporate Oversight progress, issues had been identified in relation to establishing a customer journey programme board. A lack of resources meant that the original timescales would not be met, however, board members were in the process of being confirmed and future board dates would be planned in due course.

Slippage had been seen against the Performance Management Framework. The main delays to the original timescales were due to the required alignment with the workforce strategy and customer journey programme.

A lack of resources and recruitment difficulties had also resulted in slippage against the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion work, the transition from Children’s to Adult’s Services, as well as the Customer Journey Strategy. A revised approach to decision making training meant that slippage had been experienced against the estimated dates of completion.

Following further evidence submitted by the third party in relation to the Expert Determination of Lion Farm, the resolution date would now take place later than expected; it was confirmed that a decision would be made by the end of March 2023.

Members were also provided an update on the risk register. In total, there were five green risks, six amber risks and one red risk. The single red risk was a new risk in relation to embedding the constitutional changes. Several risks had been reduced including the performance management framework and date quality and the agreement of constitutional changes risk had been closed completely.

In response to questions from members, officers would provide more specific clarification in relation to difficulties around the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion workstream had a later date.