Today’s non-job of the week is a tale of two job adverts. The first is our non-job of the week, yet another example of misused and misplaced scarce resources. The next is a job within a charity which you will read about later.
But first, reading these non-jobs every week I’m left thinking whether we should undergo research into how much the equality and diversity industry costs the taxpayer. Essex County Council – aside from spending £36 million on middle management and £4 million on its own self promotion – now thinks Essex taxpayers should fork out £86,000 minimum for a ‘Customer Impact Manager’. What, I hear you ask, is a Customer Impact Manager? Well, read on and find out as we present to you our non-job of the week:
“Customer Impact Manager
£66,000-£86,000 with more available for an exceptional candidate
Essex Works.
IT WILL BE NICE IF YOU WIN FRIENDS.
BUT IT'S ESSENTIAL THAT YOU INFLUENCE PEOPLE.
Change Everything
From £66,000 - £86,000 with more available for an exceptional candidate
With backing at the very highest level, your objective will be nothing less than to capture the hearts and minds of thousands of people right across this massive organisation, inspiring them to change the way they work to deliver the best quality of life in Britain. As our new Customer Impact Manager you'll champion the Local Government Equality Standard and ensure its values are embedded within service planning throughout an authority serving 1.4 million people.
Confident and highly credible, you should have a good understanding of local government and real empathy with the equality and diversity agenda. Proven ability to deliver change within a large, complex organisation is a must, together with highly developed influencing and motivational skills.
For further information, please refer to the Saxton Bampfylde website (http://www.saxbam.com/jobs) using reference LESF, or request an information pack by telephone on +44 (0)1483 409713.
For a confidential discussion about this opportunity, please contact Steve Lemmon or Jo Austin on +44 (0)20 7227 4069.
The closing date for receipt of CV's is 29 February 2008.
Preliminary interviews will be held between 3-14 March 2008 and final interviews on 10 April 2008.
Achieving quality through equality
SAXTON BAMPFYLDE HEVER
THE AMROP HEVER GROUP
Essex County Council
POSITIVE ABOUT DISABLED PEOPLE
INVESTOR IN PEOPLE”
The bold and italics are my doing, the capital letters are theirs and emphasise the sheer excitement Essex CC must have in advertising for this example of wasteful middle management. Clearly a job that tries to “ensure its values are embedded within a service” is not actually delivering a frontline service to taxpayers. It’s servicing the service. Why?…nobody knows. We have perfectly good equality and diversity laws that seem to be working well. Got a problem, take it to a tribunal. Job done! Or rather, non-job done!
Now for the comparison. Essex County Council’s non-job measures 30 centimetres by 15 centimetres on the fourth page of the Guardian society jobs page. It’s a taxpayer funded advert for taxpayer funded position that barely provides a frontline services and goes to swell up middle management even more.
Now compare this with a 6 x 6cm job advert from the Sir Oswald Stoll Foundation, a charity funded by the Royal British Legion that provides homes and support to vulnerable and disabled ex-servicemen. The Essex County Council middle management post is advertised on page 4 of the Guardian jobs section, right at the top of the page. The advertisement for The Sir Oswald Stoll Foundation is tucked away on page 9 at the bottom of the page, completely secluded.
One could say the OSF has such a small advert because they want to channel all their funds to serving those in greatest need. If so, this is a lesson for local government to heed before it spends millions of pounds on self congratulatory publicity and middle management jobs far removed from frontline services.