Consultancy

Board Effectiveness

Ensure that Boards are fully aligned with your organisation’s mission, and that their roles and responsibilities are clear and effectively executed
Provide tailored support to Board members, ensuring they are equipped with the skills and knowledge needed to perform their roles effectively, including navigating complex or distinctive governance arrangements
Address interpersonal dynamics within Boards, such as the relationship between Board members and the interactions between the Board Chair and senior executives, to foster a collaborative and productive environment
Assess and improve the overall impact of your Board’s work, ensuring that lessons learned are used to enhance future governance practices

Conduct an independent review of your council’s constitution, including practical application
Produce an action plan to support change
Align activity to your next Annual Governance Statement
Address both the written rules and the attitudes and behaviours around them
Provide guidance to help authorities instil a sense of collective ownership of their constitution, where people live and breathe its values

Review your council’s constitution, assessing the clarity, consistency, and alignment of its provisions with your governance goals. Evaluate how the constitution is practically used by officers and members, identifying gaps between the written rules and practices
Analyse the attitudes and behaviours of those using the constitution, providing solutions to any misalignments or challenges that may arise
Work with your council to leverage the constitution as a tool for broader organisational change, ensuring it supports not just governance but also wider transformation efforts
Employ a mix of journey mapping, structured interviews, surveys, and technical advice to gather evidence and provide comprehensive support. This includes annotation, revision, and redrafting services, while ensuring legal oversight by the Monitoring Officer

Explore the possibility of changing formal governance arrangements, for example if moving away from a leader/cabinet model
Support councils to map out design principles, and detailed ways of working to build strength into governance processes e.g. though a series of facilitated workshops
Provide guidance on pinning down the structure needed to deliver the objectives of the agreed principles
Facilitate agreement of the way forward to enable councils to move forward with their governance change

Expert support to rethink the council’s relationship with residents
Work with stakeholders to co-design activities
Design and lead public engagement activities and member surveys, to gather comprehensive insights to develop findings and recommendations
Produce a robust, evidence-based report with actionable recommendations to guide the implementation of changes that strengthen local democracy
Facilitate a reflective exercise post-review to capture key learnings and ensure that these insights inform future democratic practices and governance improvements
Conduct independent reviews of existing plans and arrangements

Ambition setting and scoping for the review, to create a learning journey
Assist in designing and planning a large-scale, complex reviews with confidence
Provide technical advice to a councillor-led exercise, e.g. undertake evidence gathering, design of a public survey and/or research to aid the process
Design inclusive public participation activities, geared to the needs of local people
Support stakeholder analysis and mapping
Advise on demographic analysis
Explore how to conduct in-depth analysis and mapping to understand and engage your community

Review current arrangements around operating culture, behaviours, relationships, and mindset
Evaluate organisational commitment and clarity of purpose
Observe member and officer skills and capacity
Investigate the current impact of the scrutiny process
Produce a report based on the findings
Provide actionable recommendations to enhance your scrutiny arrangements, ensuring they are robust, impactful, and contribute to better governance outcomes
Evaluate and enhance the effectiveness of scrutiny in councils and combined authorities
Apply best practices derived from CfGS’s two decades of research and experience, along with statutory and non-statutory guidance, to ensure your scrutiny processes are effective and aligned with national standards

Review what’s happening today against the backdrop of the priorities of the council. This will usually involve talking to a cross section of people involved in the process, and observing scrutiny meetings
Focus on how the culture underpins the overview and scrutiny process. This will include equality diversity and inclusion in scrutiny, and how the Council’s corporate approach to scrutiny influences the process
Look at strengthening member and officer relationships, and shared clarity of purpose
Consider the current impact of scrutiny, what's working well and how that can be enhanced
Assess skills or capabilities gaps which may affect the effectiveness of the scrutiny process
Interrogate how effectively information is being used
Explore key parts of the process such as information access, work programming and in house impact assessment arrangements.
Produce a report with recommendations based on our findings that showcase strengths and suggest actions to enhance your scrutiny arrangements
Provide suggestions on officer support required to implement recommendations

Identify and analyse the objectives, motivations, and influence of key stakeholders, ensuring that their engagement is strategically aligned with your governance goals
Develop and implement tailored strategies to improve how your organisation engages with stakeholders, fostering collaboration and shared purpose
Review and strengthen the mechanisms for stakeholder challenge, ensuring that oversight and scrutiny are robust and contribute to better decision-making