Business acumen for the public sector

How to create value for money using commercial methods

Part of the Financial machinery of government series

About the workshop

This practical two day workshop provides participants with new perspectives on how business principles can be used in public sector agencies. Participants are guided through a framework using real life examples with opportunities to apply business acumen to their department.

For:

Those who want to develop their knowledge and use of commercial business principles and methods to deliver improved efficiency, effectiveness and value for money through improved policy making and improved service delivery. This includes General Managers, Business Unit Managers, Principal Policy Advisers, Senior Policy Advisers, Policy Advisers, Policy Analysts and Business Analysts

Objectives:

After completing this workshop you will be able to:

Understand the current context and how to respond to government priorities, departmental drivers and the current fiscal position
Improve departmental value for money
Create best value service delivery: Segmenting and differentiating services to ensure outputs deliver desired outcomes
Reprioritise resources and align baselines having identified what you would do if this was your business?
Adopt commercial methods in your department to deliver services that people want and are willing to pay for
Implement sustainable techniques for improving efficiency, effectiveness and utilisation of resources

Topics:

Implementing business acumen in the public sector:

Understanding Context: Current government priorities, fiscal outlook and drivers for economic transformation
Creating Value: What are we doing? What are we not doing? How should we be doing it? How to segment/ differentiate services to create value
Maximising funding sources: Understanding current funding formulas and identifying opportunities and risks associated with new funding sources
Business-like Thinking: What would you do differently if this was your business? What do your customers want? What is the customer willing to pay? What is the opportunity cost?
Continuous Improvement: Sustainable techniques for improving efficiency, effectiveness and utilisation of resources
Adaptation: How to adapt current practices and bring it all together: A framework for delivering improved service delivery and policy advice
Evidential reporting: Proving the value of policy and operational changes, Pre and Post Measures of financial/ economic impacts of realigned proposals on outputs and outcomes

What our participants say:

'I liked the engaging conversations with fellow participants about ideas raised in the class' - Michelle Broadhurst, Business Analyst, Tourism New Zealand.

Our training programmes:

Introduce practical tools and techniques to improve organisational performance
Build business acumen and commercial orientation competencies
Develop critical thinking and evaluation skills
Cater for all learning styles and use accelerated learning techniques
Engage participants in business cases and examples

Participant feedback from 'Business acumen for the public sector'