April 2011

ROLE PROFILE

Role Title:Head of Housing Management

Service Area:Housing

Directorate:Community Wellbeing

Accountable to:Assistant Director Housing

Grade:M

JE Code:JE0019

Purpose of job

To provide leadership and strategic management of the Council’s tenancy and estate management service through teams based in a range of locations throughout Milton Keynes.To deliversustainable tenancies, support neighbourhood regeneration and contribute to community cohesion,

Key Objectives

1 / To ensure thatCouncil and privately rented housing tenancies contribute to community wellbeing, and by working with the housing management team develop the wider regeneration objectives of the council.
2 / To oversee and direct the work of the local teams inmaximising income collection, which is a key factor in the sustainability of the Housing Revenue Account.
3 / To ensure thatresident involvement where appropriate is enabled and delivered by locality teams so that our services become more relevant and better meet the diverse needs of our customers.
4 / Direct the Council’s operational services to private sector housing,working corporately to maintain and improve the quality, and fitness of purpose of the private sector housing stock in Milton Keynes.
5 / To manage and monitor income and expenditure budgets, setting and taking the lead in forecasting, monitoring and control to meet the council’s priorities and to achieve maximum value for money.
6 / To work across the service to ensure that empty homes are re-let as quickly as possible, to maximise income and contribute to sustainable communities.
7 / To ensure the effective corporate and inter-agency management of anti social behaviour as caused and experienced by council tenants and leaseholders, enabling residents to have quiet enjoyment of their homes.
8 / To sustain tenancies by providing leadership, planning and direction so that housing management practices enable vulnerable people to live independently and dovetails with support and care provision.
9 / To monitor, manage and report performance across a wide variety of activities and allocate resources accordingly.

Scope

  1. Revenue budgets in the region of £4.5 million. £2.5 million is staffing of which £0.5 million is General Fund and the majority is HRA. The remainder are operational budget relating to tenancy services, including enforcement and legal costs; estate management costs on open space and block cleaning and the overheads incurred from operational premises.
  1. The focus of tenancy and estate management is a customer base ofc14, 000 direct council customers (including c11,000 council tenants and c3,000 shared owners and leaseholders and2 Gypsies and Travellers managed sitesand 3000 garages. The team also provide services to private owners, landlords and tenants.
  1. A management team of six first line managers
  1. Complex relationships externally and politically,building and maintaining effective working networks with delivery agencies including the police and fire and rescue services and support agencies
  1. Works corporately to lead, develop and support strategies, projects and contracts, which contribute to these service and corporate objectives.
  1. Directly influences the standing of the Council in the community, especially in areas where the council is the landlord, there are privately rented dwellings and where regeneration and development agendas are needed and pursued.

People

Leads and Manages Internally

  • Accountable for a team of approximately 85 employees
  • Directly manages six first line managersthrough effective performance management including annual appraisals and 1 to 1s
  • Accountable for, staff recruitment, development, support, training, capability, disciplinary, and effective deployment to meet the needs of the service
  • Liaises, coordinates and negotiates with heads of service and assistant directors
  • Works with the Head of Assets and Resources and Head of Access to ensure policy and strategic activity that relates to cross cutting issues is appropriately owned and managed

Networks and commissions externally

  • Negotiates with registered providers, the Homes and Communities Agency, statutory, commercial and voluntary organisations to procure commission, monitor and improve services and value for money
  • Networks at a senior level with advisory and policymaking organisations to ensure awareness and influence of national issues so that strategy, policy and delivery.
  • Networks with national and regional government offices and ministries to influence and implement national policy effectively
  • Engages with and enables tenants and residents in decision-making and scrutiny

Financial

  • Responsible within the Housing Revenue Account and General Fund for budgets totalling approximately £4 million including staffing budgets in the region of £2 million
  • Responsibility for the recovery and management of debt and collection charges within the HRA and from private landlords to a current value of £6 million a year
  • Responsible for setting policies and budgets for third party agents and contractors relating to these budgets
  • Awareness of, and responsibility for, adherence to the Council’s and stakeholders’ financial regulations
  • Responsible for commissioning and procuring goods and services related to the management of assets up to a value of £5m
  • Provides strategic leadership to income management and debt recovery jointly with Head of Assets and Resources

Non Financial

Data

  • Ensures that tenancy and estate management information is maintained, provided and used to target investment and respond to housing need
  • Ensures that budget information is available and used in a timely way
  • Ensures that sufficient performance data is collected from third parties to provide proper assurance to the Council that it is receiving value for money and not being placed at risk
  • Researches business and policy opportunities regarding issues such as anti social behaviour and social housing tenancies

Systems

  • Leads across the housing service on tenancy and estate management information technology
  • Accountable for the safe management of workplaces including residential blocks and the homes of individual customers
  • Ensuring that the corporate risk register is updated.
  • Ensuring that business continuity arrangements are in place.

Contracts

  • Procures and commissions tenancy management and estate management related goods and services
  • Provides scrutiny and assurance on cost and quality in all tenancy management and estate management contracts

Assets

  • Responsible for ensuring the day-to-day safe operation of local offices and customer access points. Three such premises currently in operation

Special Factors

  • Named delegate for the council under RegulationofInvestigatoryPowersAct2000(RIPA)to authorise covert surveillance.
  • Lead officer for the authority on statutory consultation regarding property closure orders

Work Profile

  1. Directs Council housing tenancy and estate managementactivity and strategy across tenures according to Council priorities, to support the economic development social cohesion and public health of the community
  2. Directs the management of private sector and especially private rented housing to support the wellbeing of local people in their neighbourhoods
  3. Ensuring the service remains competitive and value for money by keeping up to date on service markets and policy environments
  4. Commissioning, interpreting and using data to develop strategies and plans
  5. Consulting and networking with stakeholders to develop strategic documents and policies
  6. Implementing strategies operationally through first line managers, agents and partners
  7. Procuring value for money services
  8. Leading by modelling appropriate behaviours and setting clear objectives and outcomes
  9. Measuring, monitoring and managing performance of first line managers and partners and contractors
  10. Allocating resources and assessing the impact of those resources
  11. Leading cross organisational projects and initiatives
  12. Building and maintaining strong and mutually beneficial relationships with Council members, partners, service providers and customers,
  13. Promoting equality and community cohesion in the delivery of services and employment relationships
  14. Ensures, with the Heads of Housing Access and of Assets and Resources that an effective out of hours service is provided

Job Context (attach the organisation chart(s) relating to the role )

Head of Tenancy and Estate Management1

April 2011

Head of Tenancy and Estate Management

PERSON SPECIFICATION

In this section the Skills, Knowledge, Qualification and Competency requirements to perform the role to a satisfactory standard are set out. The extent, nature and level of the role holder’s knowledge and skills should be specified

Awarenesssome knowledge or skills sufficient to show aptitude and the ability to learn in the particular work area

Significant knowledge and skills gained through practice and/or qualification sufficient to fulfil the role requirements

Extensiveknowledge and skills gained through practice and/ or qualification to fulfil the role requirements and contribute to training others and developing policy and practice in the work area

PERSON SPECIFICATION / Examples specific to role / Required / Level / Method of Assessment interview, testing, reference
Essential / Desirable / Awareness / Significant / Extensive
SKILLS AND KNOWLEDGE
Technical knowledge and qualifications / Professional housing qualification / degree or demonstrable continuing professional development
Management qualification or demonstrable continuing managerial development
Detailed and current knowledge and application of housing tenancy and anti-social behaviour legislation, case law and policy framework
Good understanding of the legislation, case law and policy framework for social housing allocations , access and private sector housing tenancies and dwellings
Evidence of successfully managing operational social housing tenancies and multi tenure estates or similar services including partnership working on anti-social behaviour / X
X
X
X / X / X / X
X / I
Planning and organising work / Demonstrable effective personal time management to meet priorities without significant direction
Effective management of competing priorities and complex workload at senior level
Ability to identify and deliver results against corporate and operational priorities as part of a Management Team / X
X
X / X
X
X / I
Planning capacity and resources / Demonstrable ability to manage staff resources to maximise the delivery of a quality, cost-effective public sector service
Evidenced skill in setting, monitoring and managing financial plans and budgets to deliver value for money.
Demonstrable track record of working with partnership organisations to add value or achieve efficiencies / X
X
X / X
X / X / I
Influencing and interpersonal skills / Demonstrable ability to listen to customers, understand and act to meet the needs of customers, individually and collectively
Interprets corporate objectives so that they can be delivered by the team
Demonstrable ability to communicate appropriately across all levels of the council including, team members, senior management and Councillors
History of effective negotiation at a senior level internally and externally / X
X
X
X / X
X
X
X / I
PROBLEM-SOLVING
Using initiative to overcome problems / Ability to use a range of information to identify and prioritise demand and supply issues and implement action plans to address them
Evidence of proactively identifying emerging policy and practice opportunities, providing options and analyses to the wider organisation / X
X / X
X / I
Managing risk / Knowledge and evidence of effective risk management (eg Finance, Health and Safety and Reputation)in the delivery of a housing service. / X / X / I
Managing change / Evidence of the effective management of change and delivery of both incremental and transformative improvement
Evidence of providing positive leadership in a rapidly changing Housing service / X
X / X
X / I
ACCOUNTABILITY and RESPONSIBILITY
Undertakes tasks without supervision / Evidence of effective large-scale project management/leadership.
Evidence of taking responsibility for the delivery of an effective Housing Service at all levels. / X
X / X / X / I
Managing people / Ability to effectively manage and motivate staff in a customer focused, cost effective service. / X / X / I
Managing financial resources / Able to demonstrate revenue and project budget control and optimisation of resources where multiple income streams need to be controlled / X / X / I

COMPETENCIES REQUIRED – All post holders must be able to comply with the Council’s core competency requirements which include communication, respect for others, customer service, drive for results, delivering the promise and continuous personal development.

In addition for those posts with management responsibilities the competencies will include managing self and personal skills, providing direction, facilitating and managing change, working with people, using resources, achieving results, promoting policy, values and culture, customer service and health and safety.

Other information

able to travel to meet service delivery requirements

available to undertake work outside of normal working hours

Signed Job holder / Signed Line Manager / Signed Assistant Director
Print Job Holder / Print Line Manager / Print Assistant Director / Date

Head of Tenancy and Estate Management1