City Reorganizes to Improve Service Delivery, Customer Service, and Accountability

Dec 13, 2016

The City of Greater Sudbury today announced a change in organization structure aimed at improving service delivery, collaboration on corporate-wide issues, and strengthening accountability at all levels of the organization. The changes result from an analysis conducted over the last several months by the Executive Leadership Team of service needs, current challenges and approaches for achieving key outcomes.

“We are realigning organizational responsibilities so we can better focus on producing the results that City Council and the community expect from us,” said Ed Archer, the City’s Chief Administrative Officer. “The Executive Leadership Team has a series of process improvements that reflect our expectation to strengthen our ability to be a responsive, accountable organization, in particular as it relates to customer service, project management, and delivering on service plans with positive results.” 

The new organization structure will assist the executive team: 

  • Create organizational norms, processes and attitudes that align with leadership direction; 
  • Effectively manage complex internal and external stakeholder relationships; 
  • Enhance customer service processes and delivery; 
  • Manage risk and inspire innovation across all levels of the organization;
  • Raise the profile of information technology across the corporation; and 
  • Implement process improvements in key areas. 

The revised organizational model will take effect in the first quarter of 2017. There will be four General Managers with accountability for community- and corporate-wide portfolios. Formerly, these portfolios had been managed by a total of seven reports to the Chief Administrative Officer. The shift to four General Manager portfolios is expected to strengthen strategic leadership on the most significant issues facing the municipality in the longer term.  A new General Manager of Corporate Services position will be posted, with responsibility for Human Resources; Information Technology; Finance, Assets and Fleet; and Legislative Services. 

“The Executive team now has a clear path to focus on needed process improvements and a structure that will help us to achieve Council’s and the organization’s objectives,” said Mr. Archer. “I look forward to reporting back to Council at a later date on how we are fulfilling our service obligations and realizing the benefits from this new structure.”

 

BACKGROUNDER - New Organization Structure

To ensure appropriate managerial emphasis on key issues, the organization structure changes will:  

  • Establish direct lines of accountability for operating plans
  • Raise expectations for executive leadership and broader business leadership at every level
  • Support efforts to match service expectations and available resources
  • Facilitate internal and external relationships/partnerships
  • Establish opportunities to assign change leadership and encourage collaboration at the most senior levels
  • Be effective for managing change for at least the next 4-6 years
  • Support the development of enterprise-wide standards

Direct reports to the Chief Administrative Officer include four General Managers and two Director positions, along with one Executive Assistant. They include:

GM, Growth & Infrastructure:  The policy and operational hub for land use planning, building services roads, transportation, works and large capital construction projects.  This area also manages the related work of Environmental Services. Tony Cecutti continues in this role.

GM, Community Development:  This general managerial area continues to provide Health and Social Services, Long-Term Care (Pioneer Manor), Children’s Services, Housing, Libraries, Museums and Heritage Resources.  This work will now include leadership of Transit Services as a key access point to social services and general community development.  This area will be specifically charged with developing a long-term plan to enhance front line customer service provision in the areas outside of the Tom Davies Square 3-1-1 call centre. Catherine Matheson continues in this role.

GM, Corporate Services:  This is a new general managerial area which includes all internal service and support functions at the City.  This area aligns Human Resources, Information Technology, Finance Assets and Fleet and Legislative, Legal and Security Services in one group. It will deliver administrative services and lead the organization through work to create long range plans, such as our Long Range Financial Plan, Enterprise IT Strategy, Asset Management Plan and other similar enterprise-wide plans.  The area will have Executive Directors accountable for the major service areas who are anticipated to be members of the Executive Leadership Team. A recruiting process for filling this role will commence as soon as possible.

GM Community Safety:  This area includes Fire, Paramedic Services and Municipal Emergency Management Services. Trevor Bain continues in this role.

Director Communications & Community Engagement:  This area will lead the development of corporate strategy and provide internal and external communications support, communications advice and event management for the City.  In this structure, the division provides general strategic advice and policy research to the Chief Administrative Officer (CAO), monitors and reports on relations with senior levels of government and will lead the development of a Corporate Customer Service Strategy that, within its initial steps, changes our 3-1-1 service so it will be the primary resource for managing the majority of citizen inquires. A recruiting process for filling this role will commence as soon as possible.

Director of Economic Development:  The Economic Development Division (EDD) will continue to report directly to the CAO and the Director will join the Executive Leadership Group.  EDD continues to lead our community economic development functions, the Regional Business Centre, Tourism and Immigration Services and facilitates the activities of the Greater Sudbury Development Corporation. Ian Wood continues in this role.

See the organizational chart here


Next Steps

Searches for the General Manager of Corporate Services and Director, Communications and Community Engagement positions will commence as soon as possible. 

A performance management process for the CAO position will be presented to Council for approval. This is the first step in establishing a renewed individual performance management program in the corporation. The second step will be to produce formal individual performance plans for direct reports to the CAO and for all Director positions. These will be established before the end of the first quarter of 2017. The basis for these individual performance objectives will be the work required to address the plans included in the 2017 Budget. 

Financial Implications 

These organization structure changes are, and were intended to be, cost neutral. The normal job evaluation review process that is applied to new or changed positions may lead to compensation adjustments but these are not anticipated to be material and would be accommodated within existing, approved resource levels.  

The move to a four General Manager model strengthens the organization’s strategic capacity and facilitates greater alignment for Director-level positions. This is critical for successfully translating strategy into yearly business plans that produce intended results. It distributes resources away from senior levels of the organization and positions the corporation for accommodating resource requirements at lower levels in the organizational structure.