ADMINISTRATION IN CONFIDENCE
(b)
(c)
(d)
of the OPO building at present scheduled for late 1981. The inspection of FED and HKGD in February/March 1981 will provide a convenient opportunity to review the position. By that time it should also be possible to see more clearly what implications the (Rayner) study of FCO/ODA "Common Services" is likely to have for the future organisation of the two wings' personnel departments.
There is room for further formal training of the department's staff in modern management techniques; of the present postings officers only 12 out of 30 (if the Ops Room records are up-to-date) appear to have attended management courses. Training Department should consider whether the middle management course needs expanding, eg to include a lecture on how the Assessment system for E stream officers works. In this connection I note that DSP Vol 22 and the Handbook on Confidential Reporting both include passages on the Assessment system. I am not convinced, however, that Service-wide understanding of it is as good as it should be and I recommend that POD consider distributing, for the benefit of reporting officers, as well as those being reported on, a simple explanatory note - perhaps in the shape of an attachment to forms XP 2 and 3.
The department should explore, in consultation with the Staff Side, the posssibility of "advertising" posts known to be coming vacant and should pursue its efforts (with the Inspectorate) to make optimum use of the remaining spare capacity on the Ops Room CRISS I computer. There are obvious difficulties about wholesale "advertising" and it will be prudent to begin with a pilot experiment, say for two DS grades, until the manage- ability of a wider scheme can be assessed.
ADP Section of the Inspectorate should give as much priority as possible to the planning work for CRISS II.
(e) If, as recommended in my PPD inspection report, a modern word processor
with information retrieval capacity can be obtained for use on manpower records, consideration should be given to its also being used for trials by POD eg in formulating grids, print-outs of seniority lists, the "language directory", preparing stock letters etc.
(f)
(g)
Mr Friston's desk (Interchange etc) is lightly loaded. Taking over of his back-up duties to the Senior Appointments Officer (Miss Taylor), will give him about 10% more work but he should also assume responsibility for general supervision of the Indiv Registry and be given the task (working to Miss Rothwell) of revising and editing the POD Handbook and (in consultation with Miss Hankins) of reviewing and if possible simplifying the numerous forms in use by the department.
Mr Friston should move from room 012 to room 101. This will facilitate the performance of his new tasks and allow his room to be used for careers/postings discussions. Further interview accommodation is being made available on the fifth floor for PPD use. This can also be used by POD when PPD do not need it.
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