For the City Council to successfully deliver its strategic objectives it is required to manage a large number of projects every year. The Council felt that there were significant opportunities to develop project delivery and related areas of work that could be improved across the authority as a whole.

Some of the general business challenges that faced the organisation included inconsistent project management with patchy examples of good practice and minimal collaboration on lessons learnt.

Manchester has some of the most exciting developments and programmes in the UK but some of the biggest project challenges. To tackle these challenges Manchester City Council is developing skills towards programme and project management excellence.

In 2003, the City Council launched an initiative to introduce a standard and generic method to support the delivery of projects across all service departments.

Key deliverables included:

The Capital Programme Group was set up to tackle these challenges and visits by the Project Management Working Group to other local authorities undertaking similar exercises established the need for support at the highest level.

A four-phase strategy was established with an early focus to build capability and capacity from within the organisation. A training programme was designed providing a through understanding of the Project Management Method and the ability to apply a range of basic project management techniques to various aspects of a project.

The initiative was well received as value was added to service delivery by actively responding to a skills gap. Over 700 members of staff attended the training course covering the basics and fundamentals of project management.

This has promoted the culture of planning and implementing change to a standard method and sharing best practice throughout the organisation. Lessons learnt include the need for 'top level' support, the quality not quantity of information, and recognising the importance of specialised knowledge.

Manchester City Council staff, the local community

Strategic Planner from the private sector to provide project management experience

Improvement and Development Agency (IDeA)
knowledge@idea.gov.uk

/09/2002

case

Urban Policy > Social inclusion & integration > Quality of life

Skills improvement