Wednesday, 26 October 2022 – Out With the Old and In With the Random and Non-existent

On Monday, our Head of Service emailed us a link to four new jobs in Economic Development’s Business & Enterprise and Industrial Strategy teams created in the restructure.

“Dear all,

“Four of the five new vacant positions in the ED team have now been advertised on Get Ahead: [link]

“…

“Expressions of interest can be made up to the deadline of 23:59 on Monday 31^st October.

“…

“If you have any questions please get in touch.

“Best regards,

“[Head of Employment and Skills]”

 

They include Place Shaping Officer, Visitor Economy Officer, Inward Investment and Internationalisation Officer and Growth Sector Lead.  No, I don’t know what these are either.

Doing a search on the popular local government jobs forum, lgjobs.com, for “Place Shaping” brought up one job: Urban Design Officer in Mid Sussex District Council’s planning department.  Place shaping is a common term used in planning.  I have never heard it used in reference to economic development or business support before, though.  “Visitor Economy” gave me one job at Portsmouth City Council for Head of Museums.  Conceivably this is a role in economic development to attract visitors and tourists to generate business activity and develop the economy that may be particular to local areas that are considered to be “destination places” and tourist attractions, and our vicinity to Central London can arguably qualify Hammersmith town centre, Westfield Shopping Centre and the Thames stretch of Fulham.  We also boast three elite football clubs in the borough: Fulham, Chelsea and QPR.  A search for “internationalisation” generated “0 Jobs”.  Inward Investment is a role within some local authorities and tends to be a specialised role for proven captains of industry to sell the location and sites to big business.  Practitioners will tend to have the ear of decision-makers in multinational businesses who can decide, and have mega-budgets, to relocate to different parts of the world, and investment fund managers to sell the benefits of a location to unicorns.

If they are a thing at all, these are very specialist roles.  So what qualifications are required in the job description?  For the Visitor Economy Officer, it reads, you will:

“Lead on the development of a Visitor Economy Strategy working with arts and hospitality businesses and strategic stakeholders to create a three-year investment plan for tourism…

“Implement best practice in business engagement…

“…and deliver business engagement and investment, and to support regeneration of the tourism and visitor economy sector, in accordance with the council’s strategic priorities.”

 

Qualifications required include:

“Excellent understanding of sector development challenges within the Visitor Economy.

“Experience of successful management and achievement of objectives in an organisation of comparable scope and complexity.

“A successful track record of engaging effectively and building productive partnerships with key stakeholders in the public, private and voluntary sectors[.]”

 

This is exceptional stuff.  Similarly, the Growth Sector Lead role:

“…will work closely with businesses from the borough’s key growth sectors to identify growth plans and establish a working relationship between businesses and the council to collaborate for mutually beneficial outcomes.”

To “regenerate town centres, help with affordable workspaces, teach people the skills they need, use procurement to support local firms and much more”, the Place Shaping Officer will write bids for inward investment funding and “develop and implement high street action plans and town centre frameworks…”  The successful candidate will have:

“Comprehensive knowledge of place shaping in an urban context” and “Experience of developing and delivering place-based initiatives”. 

 

The Inward Investment and Internationalisation Officer is an even more senior role.  He or she will “lead on the boroughs [sic] strategic investment priorities providing an intelligent client link to stakeholders.”

 

So what is this weblink where the vacancies have been advertised and where we will find these exalted people?  Get Ahead is on the council’s internal intranet.  It is a council initiative and a perk of working for a local authority: ringfenced opportunities to be developed and forge a career.  The blurb at the top of the page says:

“At H&F, we believe in growing our own and we want to encourage our people to grow their talent and Get Ahead.  Take a look at some of the opportunities we have on offer - you might just find your next job!​”

 

Get Ahead is an HR (now called People and Talent) scheme to give officers a chance to change direction in their careers and work in roles where they are trained in new skills and gain the experience to grow.  Except that the jobs advertised on it ask for exceptional and specialised experience and qualifications, if they exist at all.  No-one from the Economic Development team can apply for the jobs because we have all just been sacked and had to reapply for our jobs, and HR was very keen to properly “confirm [us] in post” before these new opportunities were advertised.  Not that any of us have the required qualifications and experience.  You basically have to already be doing the roles to be qualified to apply.  Perhaps they think existing officers in, say, Facilities Management, Adult Social Care or Children’s Centres are mixing with the business elite in the BRIC countries?  But I will have to wait to see if he gets any applications before midnight on Monday.

Dev, pictured at the top of the Get Ahead Intranet page: one of our own.  “Our focus, your development”.  I wonder if any more officers are developed as a result of this campaign managed by HR in combination with the council’s recruiting managers?