Highways Agency

Supporting an improved service

Our approach

We will continue to use and develop our approach to planning and performance management using the Agency's "balanced scorecard".

This sets a framework showing our five objectives that support delivery of our overall aim. Whilst customer service is our prime objective, we recognise that it is important that we carefully plan and manage to meet our four other objectives to ensure that we achieve our aim.

 

Teamwork

We encourage our staff to work together in dynamic teams and partnerships, as good teamwork within the Agency and with our partners helps to deliver improvements to our services. We have a wide range of partners and other stakeholders, including:

• Our suppliers and industry in general. We are one of the country's major public sector clients, currently procuring some 95% of our services from external suppliers. Our procurement strategy sets out how we will increase quality and reduce whole life costs, for example by developing longer-term partnerships;
• The police, who work alongside the Agency to help manage traffic, deal with incidents and keep delays to a minimum;
• Regional planning bodies, government offices, regional development agencies and local authorities, with whom we work as part of local and regional planning processes;
• Other Department for Transport agencies, such as the Driver and Vehicle Operator agencies, with whom we work on safety initiatives such as the 'Think' campaign to influence driver behaviour;
• Other transport providers, such as the Welsh and Scottish regional administrations, local authorities, the Strategic Rail Authority and others, who work with us on integrated transport initiatives; and
• The media, which helps to keep road users informed.

Improvement

To meet our ten-year plan targets, we need to ensure that learning, innovation and continuous improvement is embedded into all of our activities through:

• Working with our partners to develop new technology;
• Understanding our customers' needs better and balancing their expectations with achievable levels of service;
• Managing change by better prioritisation of work and ensuring all initiatives are clearly aligned to the Agency's aim;
• Changing our culture to deliver a public facing and customer focused traffic management and information service;
• Developing more effective and efficient approaches to project delivery; and
• Modernising our business processes and systems.

Diversity

The achievement of our objectives depends critically on how our workforce develops and responds to the challenges we face. The implementation of our new traffic management role represents a major organisational challenge, involving the recruitment, training and accommodation over the next two years of hundreds of staff with a set of responsibilities and skills very different from those traditionally undertaken by the Agency. It requires considerable management, effort and commitment, including significant support on 'people' policies, systems and processes.

The aim is to ensure this frontline responsibility can be established and integrated into the existing work of the Agency so that each part of the organisation, individually and collectively, contributes to the achievement of our objectives.

Through the continued development of our people strategy we will ensure that our people management, personnel and development policies and systems fully support our people in the delivery of our business objectives. Activities will include:

• Continuing to embed our organisational values of integrity, customer service, teamwork, diversity, improvement and best value into our performance management, development and recruitment and selection systems;
• Focusing our development and training on the skills necessary to support our current and future roles;
• Further enhancing the leadership skills of our managers;
• Taking forward work arising from our 2003-04 staff survey and other feedback, while maintaining our commitment to the Investors in People standard;
• Rewarding performance;
• Maintaining and improving recruitment and selection measures to secure progression and appointment of the right people with the right skills from diverse backgrounds;
• Continuing to implement the Agency's race equality scheme and recent legislation aimed at encouraging the development of a more diverse workforce;
• Ensuring satisfying and rewarding jobs, which maximise the potential of our workforce; and
• Adopting flexible working practices to help provide an appropriate work/life balance.

Best Value

With responsibility for operating a public asset valued at over £65 billion, it is important that we continue to ensure that our business processes and systems are effective by embracing best practice management and procurement processes.

We will ensure that the Agency continues to operate a sound mechanism for internal control through:

• Planning procedures to ensure future programmes are aligned with Government policy and our strategic direction;
• Performance management procedures including regular reviews by our board;
• Clear capital investment control mechanisms, supported by techniques such as investment appraisal, value management and value engineering;
• Sound project management and project sponsorship disciplines;
• Procurement processes that reflect best practice and best value;
• Established management processes for project management and IT security;
• Transparent processes and checks in place to ensure effective corporate governance; and
• Sound asset management processes, including management of our property portfolio.

Managing risk

The Agency operates formal risk management procedures aimed at ensuring that all high risks to our business are identified and receive focussed management attention, either in the form of treatment, where cost effective, or of contingency plans.