Future Working Arrangements for Office-based Staff and Interim Guidance on the use of Council Office Buildings

30 June, 2021

Dear Colleagues,

I am always mindful that we are a diverse organisation which provides services in a huge range of different locations, including those colleagues who work in the community collecting recycling, in our schools, care homes and other settings.

This update focuses on the arrangements between now and September for those who are based in an office setting. As I have mentioned in some of my recent weekly messages and in my Question Time sessions work is currently underway to look at how an organisation we can strike the best balance between home and office working in a post-Covid world for our office and other work-place based colleagues.

This work will continue over the summer and although no decisions have yet been taken, I wanted to offer all staff an update on how this work is being undertaken and the key issues under consideration.

Each of the Council’s Directors, Lance Carver, Paula Ham, Miles Punter and I, are leading small teams looking at future arrangements for each of the organisation’s buildings and how we can make the most of the new ways of working the Council has adopted since the start of the pandemic.  

The last year has demonstrated how critical our services are to our residents and our communities and all our staff should be proud of the way we have all continued to operate and function during very challenging times.  In planning for the future, we have to ensure that our service users are at the forefront of our thinking.  In addition, for many of us the ability of being able to balance the demands of our jobs with our lives outside of work has been really important.  As a result, making it possible for staff to achieve the right work/life balance so we can continue to deliver the best quality services our residents expect is also at the centre of our planning.

Many staff have told us in the recent staff surveys and at other employee engagement forums that they would like a blend of office/workplace and home working to become the default. Wherever practical I would like to make this happen. I’d also like us to have more spaces within our buildings to help staff to step away from the desk they are working at and take a break. The key to achieving this will be flexibility. This will apply to many things and not least to how we use our available buildings and the spaces within them. 

As a Council we have made a significant investment in digital connectivity and devices over the past year. The project teams are also looking at how we can make the absolute most of this investment and enable remote working to be as effective as possible. As well as ensuring all staff have the correct equipment, this also means ensuring our buildings are set-up to support digital working, for example by having spaces for individuals to participate in online meetings.

In many cases the ways in which our teams work together to deliver our services has changed significantly during the pandemic. Where new arrangements are working well, we need to keep these and to do this we need accommodation that makes it easier to work together. This could mean that collaborative working areas and breakout spaces take the place of our current traditional office spaces.

This work also needs to be undertaken with our longer-term strategic aims in mind, for example our commitment to tackling climate change by reducing the carbon emissions of the organisation.

It should not be lost on any of us that we are currently presented with an opportunity unlike at any other time to transform how this Council operates for the better. I am very proud that in the Vale we have a strong track record of achieving success by embracing change. There are countless examples of how in recent years our Reshaping work has seen us lead the way in tackling some of the challenges faced by the public sector in Wales. I have every confidence that the same approach will see us establish new ways of working fit for the 21st Century and the post-Covid world.

As the project progresses, I will keep you all updated. The project teams will also be making contact with individual service areas to provide opportunities for colleagues to become involved in shaping the future plans.

In the meantime, I have this week circulated guidance to all line managers on interim arrangements for use of our buildings and office spaces. I expect these to be in place until at least September. The interim guidance sets out the way in which our work spaces can be used safely where it is necessary for people to work from a particular location, including the requirement for the use of face masks when moving around buildings and cleaning of workstations and equipment. You can access the full guidance note on Staffnet+.

If you have any questions about your current working arrangements, you should speak to your manager in the first instance.

Thank you all for your continued hard work and commitment to delivering the best possible services to our communities.

Diolch yn fawr,

Rob Thomas.