WHEN you are ranked as one of Britain’s worst local authorities for the second year running, only the most radical of recovery strategies will do.

Failing Swindon borough council decided to embark on a salvation exercise with a course more akin to Sandhurst army officer training than local government. It decided to change all 184 of its senior managers into leaders.

The difference between a manager and a leader may seem small, but it is crucial, said Jane Colbourne, the council’s HR director for learning and development, who set up a “leadership academy” with the consultancy Mast International.

“How do you tell a leader? When you look around and there is somebody following you,” she said. “If you are a manager, you just sit there and manage the resources you have. We had a lot of managers.”

Other councils have sent staff for leadership training, but this is believed to be the most extensive exercise of its kind carried out in local government.

Colbourne believes that putting the council’s entire top echelon through the leadership academy has already helped matters at Swindon. In 2002 and 2003 the council was rated “poor”— the lowest of five rankings — in the annual comprehensive performance assessment by the Audit Commission, the public-services watchdog. In its latest report, the commission marked Swindon up a level, to “weak”. The council sees this as a start and hopes to improve further in the next audit.

After its first rating, the council decided to seek change at all levels of its organisation through improved leadership.

Mast was hired to create a programme that included components on leadership styles and managing change, with sessions on subjects such as self-awareness and relationship management.

Nobody was excused attendance at the course. Even the chief executive had to go.

Colbourne said senior executives were not made to shoulder the blame for the poor ratings. “We were not telling people they were failing. It was a case of some of us being good at some things, and others good at other things — let’s pool those skills so we can start working together.

“Other councils would have done this type of leadership work. What is significant about our case is that we put so many people through the academy in a tight timescale. In all, 184 of our managers took three modules each in about six months. And every one of those managers had at least two coaching sessions in addition. We believe the results are there for everybody to see in our improved ratings.”

Jonathan Chalstrey of Mast agreed. “It was not enough to do a programme like this with 10 or even 30 people,” he said. “The key here was critical mass. It was essential that all the managers went through the programme. It is vital that they speak the same language and realise what the priorities are.”

Colbourne said: “One thing we were criticised heavily for by the commission was our ‘silo mentality’. This is where everyone works away in their own department without talking to other parts of the council.

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