Breakthrough Solutions

What it is

Breakthrough Solutions is a consultancy service which is part of the Capability Building Programme. It works by offering Departments an opportunity to submit a policy or delivery problem and have a specially assembled team of civil servants with the right skills and experience, work with them as project consultants to solve it.

The projects are managed by the Capability Building team in the National School of Government that have specialist experience of these interventions.

Selected projects

Four projects were funded in 2010/11:

Decentralisation: Opportunities and Challenges for Local Leadership. For DCLG
Scaling up Innovation in the Public Sector. A joint project with BIS and DCLG
The Universal Credits Transition. A cross-public sector project
Children’s Services Commissioning. For Peterborough City Council and partners

About the projects

Decentralisation: opportunities and challenges for local leadership

This project for DCLG was completed in December 2010. A summary of the findings and information about the project is as follows:

Project objectives

Understand current leadership challenges and opportunities at the local level.
Identify main and initial decentralisation and Big Society opportunities and challenges for local leaders.
Develop an understanding of the change needed at different levels to meet these opportunities and challenges.
Highlight potential implications for local leaders and others (including central government) and consider how we can apply these lessons.

Summary of the project findings
Speaking to people across all levels (national, local, ultra-local and political) the project team found five common themes:

Culture and behaviour change - an overarching challenge to move away from the default.
Messages - a perception of mixed messages and not yet a clear understanding.
Relationships and trust - the challenge of breaking away from years of command and control.
Roles – a difficult balance between the need for frameworks alongside flexibility.
Decisions and accountability - concerns around which level decisions and accountability lie and who is really responsible for what.

Next steps

As part of the work on this project, the project team has developed a set of outputs that will help the work on decentralisation and leadership move beyond recommendations to practical actions.
The project team developed these outputs in the context of the five key messages from our findings (cultural and behavioural change, messaging, relationships and trust, roles and decision making) and the challenges for leaders that arise from these in creating the conditions for change, behaviour change and skills development.
Discussions are continuing to ensure commitment by key “implementers”.

See a presentation on the full findings of the project.

Scaling up innovation in the public sector

This project started in January 2011. It is for BIS and DCLG.

Project objectives

Collaborative cross-government project that looks beyond the creation of conditions for stimulating innovation to exploring how organisations in the public sector learn from each other and share / disseminate this knowledge effectively.
Produce solutions to the challenge of scaling up public sector innovation that are sustainable and provide a lasting impact and that are delivered by and for Whitehall and wider public service partners.
Opportunity for team members to try out innovative approaches.

See the project charter.

More information will be provided about this project as it progresses.

The Universal Credits Transition

This project started in January 2011. It is a cross-public sector project.

Situation
Universal Credit is a single integrated credit to replace a range of income related working age benefits and Tax Credits. It will increase the incentive and rewards of work and make them more transparent. Universal Credit replaces benefits and credits currently delivered by DWP, HMRC and Local Authorities.

Regardless of whether current organisations have a future role in delivering the Universal Credit, their roles and functions will change significantly and all will need to make an effective transition, while maintaining service delivery. Transition is likely to run from October 2013 to 2017.

Challenge
The challenge is to be able to identify and define the transition issues, both risk and opportunities, across the existing delivery system and therefore, across the public sector.

Project objectives

To obtain an understanding of some of the risks and opportunities offered by the transition to a universal credit benefits system by looking at process and organisational factors (both cultural and structural).
To identify where opportunities exist to develop solutions that will bring about system level improvement.
To provide a demonstrably cross-public sector analysis of key transition planning issues.
To build internal capability and understanding of different organisational perspectives.
To offer a stretching development opportunity for a team of public service professionals at working across organisational boundaries that enables knowledge transfer and enhances working relationships.

See a presentation on the project outline. More information will be provided about this project as it progresses.

Children’s Services Commissioning

The project started at the end of March 2011. It is for Peterborough City Council and its partners, health commissioners and practitioners.

Situation
The project is about the commissioning of children’s services, specifically the transfer of the away from Primary Care Trusts and to GPs. Children’s services are currently commissioned by local authorities and PCTs, working together with various models of integration, ranging from loose co-operation to binding legal agreements. The coalition government is legislating for a new NHS with GP consortia and Health and Well Being boards holding local funds and commissioning services.

Challenge
The challenge for all local commissioners of children’s services is to understand the opportunities and issues associated with the changes, and to effectively manage the transition. Added to this are the demands of working in an environment of reducing funds, and a localism agenda where power is being decentralised.

Project objectives

To understand how the changes affect children’s services commissioning in a particular locality, and how this differs across the country. Map out the time table for change and what needs to be in place to ensure continuity.
To help understand which children’s services are best commissioned by different parts of the system and the right level of integration between parts for the Host Location. Demonstrate how improvements in children’s outcomes will be realised, and highlight any risks.
To be clear about the opportunities that the changes bring, and the barriers to realising them.
To involve stakeholders in discussions to ensure that their perspectives are included and to begin the process of joint working in the new system.
To develop learning for other localities which will need to make their own changes.
To contribute to evidence on how central government can support and facilitate change locally.