CEO’s 100 day report calls for end to ‘silo culture’
Subscriber only
REAL time transparency and an end to internal “silos” will be the hallmarks of the new Gympie Regional Council, CEO Shane Gray has revealed in his first full report on the organisation.
Mr Gray this week delivered his 100 day report to councillors with findings including systems which slowed things down and a structure which isolated departments from each other.
“If we’ve got depots and work sites all over the place … you tend to work in isolation and you may make a decision in one department not realising it impacts other areas of council,” Mr Gray said.
He pointed to an historical example near the Fiveways roundabout where, in the past, the council had ripped the footpath concrete up, relaid it, and then returned a week later and cut the new concrete up to lay a new pipe.
“We’ll actually plan our jobs before we start,” he said.
It was not the only problem he found in need of urgent attention.
Mr Gray said in his report it was clear early on that the council’s financial sustainability, systems and processes “were in critical need of review”.
MORE GYMPIE NEWS
- Police escalate manhunt following brutal Gympie murder
- Police look for two men following Southside crash
One of the fixes being rolled out is a partnership with Queensland Treasury as part of a business improvement.
QTC will not be the only helping hand.
“We’ve got externals to do audits of all our procurement contracts to look for anomalies, or improvement in our systems,” Mr Gray said.
“We’re also looking at bringing in immediate responses to transparency like the Open Gov platform.”
Ipswich City Council introduced its Open Gov system in the wake of its corruption scandal, which included the sacking of its councillors and the jailing of its former mayor, Paul Pisasale.
Open Gov has already made a mark in the south.
Political analyst Neil Glentworth said at the last Gympie Chamber of Commerce breakfast the system had been brought in because “nobody trusted that council” and since its introduction Ipswich’s reputation flipped from “dodgy” and “corrupt” to “open”.
Mr Gray said this type of system would streamline areas like development applications, and free up staff workloads.
“A lot of the manual work loads that our staff spend a lot of time doing, we can reduce that and actually speed up processing time” Mr Gray said.
“Which will be good for staff and also good for applicants … you can actually see how your assessment is tracking.”
