PhD Final Thesis April 2013.pdf - Anglia Ruskin Research Online

Appendices to Thesis Keith Gale 2013Umm, well its definitely a big advantage for the contractor to be on a framework. Ifyou’re not on the framework it’s a disaster. So I would be a big fan if I could be onthe next framework.Q19 Do you feel that the use of incentives to encourage good performance withinframeworks is worthwhile? Do you have views as to what these incentives shouldcomprise?Definitely. Incentives which currently encourage good performance.. well.. I think..from my point of view. You know, I've been with my company a long time. Theethos has been inbred that you always try to provide good performance and you try tofilter that out. I don’t really, I couldn’t really understand why you wouldn’t want todo the best every time. Yet, you’re only as good as the people you’ve got workingfor you and you cant always do as good as you like. So incentivising it, well, at theend of the day it all comes down to money and whether you get that money byhaving advanced payments or more turnover with margins that you can live with…its still money at the end of the day. I think they are incentives at the end of the day. Ithink that’s why we do our frameworks because the guaranteed workload (or if youlike its more guaranteed than not being in a framework) the turnover does mean youcan finance you’re fixed costs and you can invest in people and know you’re going toget your value out of them. You can invest in recruitment offices, support staff, ummyeah. And if you get the key use out of them then you’re more likely to be efficient.So what do the incentives comprise? … umm guaranteed turnover. It would be niceto have guaranteed profits, umm but the framework doesn’t guarantee profits andsometimes you can be knocked into losses. We have been knocked into frameworkswhere they just don’t pay. We still do the best we can in the hope of turning it round,in the hope of getting agreements which improve a situation.. umm you fulfil yourcontract and move on. I’m not sure whether a financial incentive would improve thatperformance. I suppose it would do if it meant you could invest more in terms ofmore people with higher qualifications and higher skills. Yeah, actually going backto the cost reimbursable contract, we had categories and skills. (We still do actuallybut I’m not involved anymore). So we could be as expensive or as cheap as the clientliked and if the client wanted a cheaper price then it would be well.. we could useless skilled people (we have a full range). It might be that it takes longer but it might429