In 1997/98 the Centre for Enabling Leadership worked with Braintree District Council to tailor a leadership development programme for their top managers. Part of this process was to develop an aligned programme for the wider Council on leadership and team working that would enable it to meet the challenge of change and acquire the flexibility needed to adapt to new community needs, financial pressures and their commitment to deliver best value. Unusually the entire workforce participated in the programme over two years. The programme recognised the need for individuals and teams to work closely with communities, users of the service as well as professional colleagues within and outside of the organisation.

As a development of this initiative, we were involved in 1999 in designing and running a modular 18 month Creating Business Excellence programme for a selected group of senior managers. This focused on fast tracking the development of core capabilities related to the changing government/business context, and the application of these capabilities to enhance service delivery and people management. A further programme is planned commencing 2001. During 2001 we have also worked with the newly created Executive and senior managers to enable different ways of working to be implemented in an effective way.