Our work with Probation Trusts is being led by Dr Stephen Goode, a former Chief Executive of a Probation Trust, and Deputy Director at the National Offender Management Service. Stephen has also worked in the Ministry of Justice and NHS at a variety of levels. Our team has expert advisors that have succeeded in developing innovative public sector spin-outs, including pioneering social enterprises. Many of these were ultimately delivered via significantly re-shaped integrated solutions, inception of new style organisations or flexible delivery vehicles. Examples include a Social Work Pilot to re-shape Adult Social Care and create a vibrant new social enterprise vehicle and cutting edge work leading the inception of one of the first Care Trust organisations (bringing together Health and Social Care services within a single integrated organisation).
Agencia can support you and new emerging organisations by providing:
- Bespoke one-on-one support and coaching to new mutuals on legal, financial, and commercial issues - including helping identify potential partners.
- Change management to support the creation of social enterprises including design, launch and delivery support. We can utilise all our skills, knowledge and experience to help you navigate through the complex partnership, political, governance and financial strands across critical environments (local, regional and national). We are a team which is determined to continuously seek innovative, modern, responsive solutions to commissioning and delivery of services and will work with you to achieve this.
- Support in bidding for contracts. The implementation of Transforming Rehabilitation creates a an environment where business as usual is no longer an option and will open up the offender management sector to new providers willing to adopt innovative working practices. These new opportunities will bring with them new challenges, particularly in the area of developing a network of ex-offenders to work as peer-mentors. How does an organisation introduce effective governance, ensure safe practice and support those working at the front-line are properly supported and developed to achieve challenging targets to reduce re-offending. We offer a service which draws on our experience and on best practise from areas such as Mental Health, the Drug and Alcohol Recovery Agenda and Patient Self Care. We use this experience and up to date academic research to enable organisations wishing to bid for the new contracts prove they have considered these difficult issues and developed robust strategies and realistic operational procedures to enable them to deliver innovative and cost-effective solutions.
- Payment by Results (PbR) is transforming the whole ethos of public sector service delivery and yet the evidence to support the efficacy of this methodology is relatively slim. Results for the Work Programme and the pilot drug and alcohol services which were delivered under a PbR regime are, at best, mixed. These results are creating a climate of fear and uncertainty which is likely to make organisations unwilling to participate in projects where a significant element of remuneration is based on PbR. We have closely reviewed what works, and what doesn’t in PbR projects in order to support organisations make informed choices about whether they can deliver their existing services in a PbR environment. Many of the apparently intractable issues can be resolved by implementing risk management techniques and by gaining a thorough understanding of what your organisation is really good at. If you are a business, social enterprise or charity facing the new challenges of bidding for PbR contracts or seeking to become a sub-contractor to one of the prime contractors we offer a comprehensive service review and assessment which will enable you to analyse your risks and identify opportunities to win sustainable business.
Benefits of working with Agencia:
- We have recently worked (and are currently working with) a number of Probation Trusts as they consider their future and can therefore share the ‘lessons learned’ with you in a way that adds value.
- Agencia has a long track record of working in the criminal justice sector and, through a ‘coaching approach’ to the delivery of our services, successfully builds capacity, capability and sustainability within organisations. Agencia also has a strong record of achievement in working with health and social care organisations to develop commissioning arrangements, service redesign and the integration of health and social care. We are able to bring this wider expertise to bear.
- All of our consultants have executive level experience in their respective sectors, and a number are former Chief Executives. They are drawn from a wide range of public and private sector organisations including the NHS, Police, Probation, Courts Service, Prisons and Local Government. Our consultants operate across the UK, and have also achieved significant change and reform in international judicial systems.
- We have experience of developing payment by results (PBR) contracts within the health and social care sectors and new organisations to deliver services within a PBR context.
- Agencia’s values stress our intention to work with you, not just for you.
- We operate high quality standards with very high levels of client satisfaction - over 80% of our work is repeat business. However we are also a company that offers value for money, so such quality and expertise comes at an affordable price that is significantly lower than the largest consultancy companies. We don’t use ‘sales’ people, the person you talk to at the start, is the person that will be delivering the work – what you see is what you get!
What Probation Trusts Say About Agencia
"The seminar Agencia facilitated was helpful in assisting us to focus our thinking and I found their formal input on different commissioning models to be a good opener for us."
Mike Maiden, Chief Executive, Staffordshire & West Midlands Probation Trust
“There are real benefits in hearing how other parts of the public sector have embraced commissioning, and being challenged in our thinking. I appreciate what Agencia can offer as a sounding board as our Trust responds to the new commissioning environment for offender management.”
Pete Brown, Chief Probation Officer for York & North Yorkshire Probation Trust
For more information about our UK Justice work, please click on the following link: {page_49}uk-justice
Alternatively, please contact Steve Pitts (Sector Advisor, UK Justice and International): stevepitts@agenciaconsulting.com (01482) 649900
