The management of local councils
Paul Masterman
The management of a council is shared between officers and councillors - and it is important you understand how an organisation is run if you want to work for it.
You may also find that you will be interviewed by a panel of councillors for certain jobs, so you should understand their role
In theory all councils are run by councillors (known within local government as members) who are part-time, unpaid politicians in the main
Usually one party or another is the largest party in the Council and takes overall control of the council and its decision-making committees.
However, in many councils no one party has a majority so technically there is "no overall control". This is known as a hung council.
In this case, the biggest party may take control of the committees but can never bank on getting support from the other parties
Services are delivered by the paid professionals, known as officers
Although there is supposed to be this split between decision making by members and delivery by officers, the latter often develop detailed policies within the political framework.
Many councils are setting up executive cabinets of senior councillors to run the organisation. The decisions of these cabinets are scrutinised by committees of "backbench" councillors.
Most councils still have a traditional, hierarchical structure with a Chief Executive at the top and different levels of officer cascading down the system
Traditionally councils have been organised in departments such as education and social services
But over the years there has been a move to more corporate style management, so in some councils you see references to "directorates" or even "portfolios". These directorates are organised around service themes e.g. community services
There is also a growing businesslike culture developing, which is why you may see smaller teams in councils referred to as "business units"
There used to be a split between staff grades (the white collar office jobs) and manuals (the blue collar "dirty" jobs), but this is changing fast.
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