Supporting Governance

We have a well-established reputation as experts in supporting those in governance roles to be effective. We fully recognise the challenges facing public service organisations and partnerships in ensuring their governance arrangements are relevant and that they build trust with the communities they serve. Our services include:

• Whole board development
• Governance effectiveness reviews
• Board member appraisal and review including a suite of integrated 360 tools for boards
• Building governance skills and knowledge
• Undertaking commissioned research on governance

These services are described below:

Whole board development

We work with whole boards to support their development, particularly at times of transition, including:

• new boards
• merging organisations
• NHS trusts facing quality or financial challenges
• Primary Care Trusts as they make the transition to world class commissioning

We also support the development of new organisational forms (such as Foundation Trusts) where we have supported the development of the board of Governors as well as boards of directors.

Governance effectiveness reviews

We have undertaken reviews for a broad range of public sector organisations. These have included developing a comprehensive board assessment framework for Foundation Trusts drawing on private and public sector best practice as well as Monitor's code of governance. Other governance effectiveness reviews have been for national agencies and regulators such as the Human Tissue Authority, the Learning and Skills Improvement Service, National Lottery Commission, Council for Licensed Conveyancers and the NHS Confederation.

Undertaking commissioned research on governance

We were commissioned by the NHS National Leadership Council to refresh the guidance for all NHS Boards in England. We also authored the think-piece on governance in further education (FE) colleges, as part of the influential, government sponsored Foster Review of FE, and were commissioned to do further work in this area for the DfES. We regularly contributed leading articles to 'Governance Matters' and are approached to contribute to national conferences on governance and board effectiveness.

Board member appraisal and review

We have developed innovative and evidence based web enabled 360 degree tools to support whole board, board member and chair appraisal and review. This includes an integrated suite of 360 degree tools for all directors on NHS boards. This work has been undertaken in partnership with NHS East of England, and is being used in over 24 organisations across the region. These tools are also now being offered to Boards across NHS Yorkshire and Humber, and have been taken up by a number of other Trusts across the country. You can find out more about these tools under 'Board Review Tools'.

Building governance skills and knowledge

Foresight Partnership offers a range of development options for public service governors and board members, ranging from a regular session on all new NHS chairs induction programmes run by the Appointments Commission, to tailored modules on:

• chairing and advanced chairing skills
• strategic thinking skills
• scrutiny and challenge

We have also designed and run induction programmes for boards of governors of Foundation Trusts, for the professional regulatory bodies (Royal Pharmaceutical Society, Architect Registration Board, Nursing and Midwifery Council).

We provide executive coaching to a diverse range of chairs and chief executives - including supporting the Chair-Chief Executive partnership through joint coaching.

 Board Review Tools

We have developed a suite of online review tools which can be tailored to suit a board's individual needs.  Within the NHS, our Board Health Review takes into account the dynamic and complex landscape of governance in the NHS and follows the new 'Healthy NHS Board Principles for Good governance.'  For more on these products, see the Board Review Tools section.

 

Supporting Leadership

We have a depth of experience in offering innovative, effective approaches to leadership development.

• Leadership development
• Executive coaching to senior leaders
• Supporting senior level selection

Leadership Development

Foresight Partnership has considerable experience in the design and delivery of leadership development programmes aimed at senior leaders. Our approach is based on our understanding of the complex leadership challenges facing people in senior leadership roles in public services. We are particularly interested in the design and delivery of bespoke leadership development approaches that are highly tailored to the specific needs of organisations.

Our approach therefore tends to combine a wide range of tools and techniques including leadership support to whole teams, facilitation of action learning sets, design and support of 'organisational raids', whole system simulations, master classes as well as more conventional 'classroom-based' learning approaches. We enjoy supporting the development of 'professional' leadership and, for example, have worked extensively to support the development of clinicians into wider leadership roles in the NHS.

Executive Coaching to Senior Leaders

We are highly experienced executive coaches and have worked with senior leaders in a wide spectrum of roles. In most cases we are approached to offer coaching support by individuals based on a personal referral. However we are increasingly offering individual executive coaching on a more programmatic basis to whole teams as part of a broader leadership development approach. Most recently we have offered time-limited coaching to support senior leaders across a whole system undergoing major organisational re-structuring.

Supporting Senior Level Selection

We bring extensive experience of senior level selection including the use of level A and B psychometric tests. Support includes development of person specifications, independent assessors on selection panels and advice on senior level job design.

Supporting Improvement

We have a positive track-record of using an organisational development approach to support organisations where improvement in their overall performance is a priority.

We strongly believe that supporting improvement involves combining effective engagement and rapport with organisations/teams, sophisticated diagnostic processes and processes aimed at releasing creative and effective problem solving in the organisation itself. We make a particular contribution to enabling boards to understand their role in shaping and supporting improvement - including quality improvement.