DFID Management Board
Minutes of the Management Board Meeting - March 2004
In working towards the delivery of the Public Service Agreement and Service Delivery Agreement, the Management Board will aim to:
A. communicate the vision, role, direction and priorities of DFID to staff and other stakeholders;
B. ensure DFID's financial resources and staff are allocated and managed effectively;
C. monitor and improve DFID's performance;
D. protect and enhance DFID’s reputation as a highly effective international development organisation.
Topic |
Attending |
Observing |
Purpose |
MB Objective |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Management Board's Self-assessment 2003-04 |
Management Board |
DFID Bolivia Staff in open rooms in PS and AH |
To consider progress against objectives and forward objectives for 04/05 |
A, B, C and D |
Board Self-Assessment
1. Suma thanked the Board Secretary for a really good paper. It had been apparent from a recent meeting of Permanent Secretaries that DFID's was the only Board in Whitehall to carry out a comprehensive annual self-assessment.
2. The Board agreed that its performance had been better on objectives B, C and the first half of D than on A and the second half of D. It had been a tough year in which to deliver these, with three Secretaries of State, the war in Iraq and internal changes. In discussion on each objective, the following points were made:
Objective A - communicate the vision, role, direction and priorities of DFID to staff and other stakeholders.
i. there was strong evidence of a wide internal and external understanding of what DFID was all about - this was supported in particular by the recent BBC poll, IIP reaccreditation report and HMT's latest assessment of DFID's progress against the PSA targets. The Board had been effective at leading the maintenance of this vision despite the challenges over the past year;
ii. Non-executive Directors thought that the Board had made extraordinary efforts compared to the private sector to communicate with staff, and consequently the knowledge gap was lower here than in comparative organisations. But the Board felt that it needed to improve its communication inside DFID further, and to demonstrate more clearly its involvement in issues, and the reasoning behind its decisions;
Objective B - ensure DFID's financial resources and staff are allocated and managed effectively
i. the Board had been very strong on allocating and managing effectively financial resources. The 90/10 split of bilateral resources between LICS and MICS had been maintained, despite challenges. The Non-Executive Directors commented that the Board had been much better than the World Bank at doing this;
ii. the Board had been less good at managing staff resources - it needed to be better at ensuring staffing of the Department's top priority areas, particularly through spreading better understanding of corporate needs. The Board needed to push harder on performance management;
Objective C - monitor and improve DFID's performance
i. the DDP Review process had been much better this year, with Directors demonstrating greater prioritisation and stronger focus on delivery. The QMR was proving to be a very useful tool and was continually improving further, although the bi-annual assessment of progress against the PSA needed more improvement;
Objective D - protect and enhance DFID's reputation as a highly effective international development organisation
i. the Board had put in a lot of work at protecting DFID's reputation on which it had faced a range of challenges over the year. This was not always widely visible. Generally the Board was getting better at risk management, with some risks having been managed off the register, but it would be important to respond faster to early warning of reputational risks. The Board would need to ensure that the Department made the most of key forthcoming opportunities, such as the 2005 G8 and EU Presidencies.
3. In discussion of what the Board could do better in 04-05 the following points were made:
a) evolution of the Board's role - the paper's diagram appropriately summed up the desired direction of movement and which the Board was actually taking. The Board would spend increasingly more time leading the development of DFID's business direction and organisation capability. Support to Ministers tended to be through line management, and real-world delivery through the Board Sub-Committees. There needed to be greater communication about why a degree of creative tension between the Board and Ministers was normal and necessary;
b) Board team ethos - this was much improved from last year. The Board was internally very cohesive, but needed to watch that this did not mean diminished communication outside the Board. It would be important to ensure that the Leadership Group had as good a team spirit. There was scope for an increased devolution of some responsibilities from Suma to other Board members.
c) relationships with Sub-Committees and the Leadership Group - these relationships, and the need to make SCS feel much more part of corporate management, would be priority for the forthcoming year.
d) role of the Non-Executive Directors - the Non-Executive Directors were providing a really effective independent viewpoint. DFID's design principles for Non-Executive Director engagement, and the nature of their involvement were regarded as best practice in Whitehall. It would be important to use the Non-Executive Directors more to update SoS with some of the perceptions of DFID from outside, and for the Board to listen even more carefully to both Non-Executive Directors' advice.
e) role of the Chairman - the Chairman was leading and motivating the Board very effectively. He was making almost optimal use of the Board members. The Chairman felt, and the Board agreed, that Masood's extensive international networks should be utilised more.
f) Board's directive approach - there was space for a more directive approach without 'commanding and controlling'. It would be important to explain more fully what a directive approach meant.
4. In conclusion, it was agreed that:
a) the purpose and objectives were rolled on to 04-05. But the Management Board would focus most this year on the first and last objectives: communicating the vision, role, direction and priorities of DFID to staff and other stakeholders and protecting and enhancing DFID's reputation as a highly effective international development organisation;
b) the work plan should reflect this focus - with space built in for the Board to consider every 2 months or so progress against each of those objectives. There should also be updates on progress on the two Presidencies, and a better early warning system for reputational risks, perhaps using the risk register;
c) the above comments should be fed into the Board self-assessment, for circulation for comments within DFID in advance of the discussion alongside the self-assessments of the Sub-Committees at April's Board meeting;
d) the Board Secretary should talk to other Board Secretaries in Whitehall and the Private Sector to look at further refinement of the Boards' communication strategy;
e) this paper and process had been very effective.
