Issue 9 Jan 2009.indd - Ministry of Defence

PACE
• Performance, Agility, Confi dence, Effi ciency • • Performance, Agility, Confi dence, Effi ciency • • Performance, Agility, Confi dence, Effi ciency • •
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ess on PACE
Report: Caroline Wickham Smith
“What I hope we’ve done is that in
focusing on the requirements of our
customers in DE&S Clusters, we’re doing
what they want in a way that allows them
to provide a better service to their front
line customers on operations. It’s always
more difficult when you work in an
‘enabling area’ such as this, to get a clear
line of sight of how what you’re doing
at your desk actually relates to someone
in Iraq or Afghanistan. We’re trying to
make this connection more visible, and I
hope the work we’re doing under PACE
and other work we’re doing on staff
engagement, should help.”
For the future the Admiral sees what
he terms ‘the three S’s’: safety, systems
engineering and skills, as his three
priorities, and his area is already making
“It’s always diffi cult in an
‘enabling area’ to get a
clear line of sight of
how what you’re doing
relates to someone
in Iraq and
Afghanistan.
We’re trying
to make this
connection more
visible.”
good progress on them. On the safety side
there are big corporate improvements to
be implemented and recommendations
from the Safety Improvement Working
Group to be taken forward.
Systems engineering underpins
through-life capability and the MOD is
becoming much more focused on this
area, so there is also work underway
for more improvements here. And as a
Skills Director the Admiral is taking an
extremely close interest in upskilling his
1,000 staff.
“Having people in place with the
right skills is a key enabler for PACE. It’s
important for me to see that we have the
right professional profile and approach to
allow flexible resourcing to be adopted,
which is another PACE enabler.
“There are a lot of highly-skilled and
technically competent people in the
S&E area and I want to make the best
use of their skills for the benefit of the
individuals concerned and the business as
a whole.”
The Admiral is generally pleased with
the progress made so far under PACE,
and is looking forward to what 2009 and
beyond will bring.
“With the help of the PACE initiative
I feel S&E is becoming a much more
forward-looking part of DE&S than
previously, and is now well-placed to
support what DE&S wants to achieve as it
moves forward. I’m anticipating a good
year ahead, and consider we’re in an
excellent position to meet the challenges
we’ll encounter.”