Parliamentary

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made over this period. These will see our
staffing levels fall by 9 in 2012-13. Using
a combination of voluntary exit, turnover
and the end of fixed-term appointments
and secondments, we will be able
to achieve these reductions without
compulsory redundancies.
41 As set out in Part 2, outturn on our
operational budget was £5.9m, against
our Estimate of £6.4m, meeting our
performance target of keeping our
administrative expenditure within the
budget provided. Staff and other savings
realised as a result of the projects set out
above allowed us to prepare an Estimate
for 2012-13 which, if approved, will
deliver a further 5% saving.
People
IPSA Fact
IPSA delivered a saving of 10% in its
budget for 2011-12 over the previous
year; and has submitted a budget
for 2012-13 which delivers a further
5% (including a 10% saving on staff
costs).
42 As a smaller organisation in the future,
we will only be sustainable if our staff
have the skills they need to meet
our administrative and regulatory
obligations; process efficiencies alone
will not be enough. In line with this,
our sustainability programme includes
a stream of work to equip IPSA with
the skills it needs, and to put in place
development plans and people policies
which will support our staff to realise
their potential.
43 All IPSA employees consider their
learning and development needs with
their manager as part of the process
of agreeing their work objectives for
the year. In 2011-12, as part of the
sustainability programme, we established
a project to meet a number of crosscutting
and individual development
needs. Programmes to develop project
management skills, performance
management capability and to allow
us get more out of our systems were
delivered. A second project was set up
to implement multi-skilling across the
organisation. To date, we have identified
posts where additional cover is required,
produced desk instructions for all key
activities and started to train people
to provide cover. In 2012-13, we will
complete the training required to ensure
all posts are covered.
44 Engaging staff is the responsibility of all
managers in IPSA but there are also a
number of organisation-wide activities,
including the Chief Executive’s weekly
meeting with all staff. During the year
we also held a series of longer events
with staff to look at a variety of current
business issues in more depth.
45 To measure our progress on engagement,
we carried out a staff survey in
September 2011. This confirmed high
levels of engagement with our objectives
but also showed that we could do better
in a number of areas, including internal
communication and offering staff greater
involvement in work to deliver change.
In response to the survey, we took a
number of steps to widen the number of
staff involved in projects and strengthen
internal communication mechanisms.
46 Our aim is to create a workplace which
respects differences, and recognises
the unique contributions which people
make. As at 31 March 2012, 38% of staff
were male and 62% female, and 27% of
employees were from an ethnic minority
background. We will continue to monitor
the background of our staff by reference
to the “Protected Characteristics” set
out in the Equality Act 2010, to allow us
IPSA Annual Report and Accounts 2011-2012