Issue - meetings

The Monitoring Officer introduced the outcomes of a staff survey undertaken in June 2020 regarding the impact of the pandemic and working from home. He highlighted a selection of figures, including the impressive response rate of 84% of staff. He noted that 95% of respondents felt connected to their teams and of the 5% who did not, Management Team were able to identify those teams and work with the Managers accordingly. He also highlighted that 98% of respondents trusted the Management Team to be making the right decisions and that the level of communication was appreciated. He noted that there was concern amongst staff about the personal impact of Covid-19 but this was to be expected given the circumstances.

Members praised the survey questions and the way the information from the survey had been collated. The high response rate was also noted to be exceptional and indicative of a workforce engaged with the organisation. A Member of Committee highlighted the number of staff who would choose to continue working from home and the Monitoring Officer confirmed that, as and when office working became possible again, there would be greater flexibility for where people chose to base themselves for the majority of their working week.

The Committee heard that there would be a second similar survey going out to staff in the coming weeks and it was programmed into the work plan for the results to be presented to both the Joint Staff Consultative Committee and the Overview and Scrutiny Committee.

The Chairman enquired whether there had been any contact with Councillors in a similar vein and the Monitoring Officer highlighted the weekly messages that were sent out by the Chief Executive. These had started as twice-weekly but moved to weekly at the end of the summer. The Vice-Chairman, Councillor Mrs D. Rodgers quoted an email she had sent to Senior Officers detailing positive feedback she had received from business and residents praising the work of the council. She stated that there had been significant mentoring from Officers with regard to the new way of working online, using MS Teams, and communications between Councillor colleagues had been helpful.

The positive response to the survey was again praised, as was the work of Officers in difficult times, and the Committee expressed interest in seeing how the situation may have changed with the continuing restrictions.

            RESOLVED that the content of the report be noted.