Strategies Commissioning - West London

MAIN PURPOSE OF THE JOB

The Lead Commissioner is responsible for the end-to-end strategic direction and delivery of commissioning, transformation and service improvement activity across Children's Services.

To provide senior programme leadership across a portfolio of commissioning and transformation projects and lead cross-functional project teams to ensure the delivery of improved outcomes for children, young people and families, value for money and financial savings.

To provide cross-cutting commissioning and commercial expertise at each stage of the commissioning cycle.

To ensure that commissioning and transformation activity provides bespoke and sovereign solutions that reflect local needs and drivers.

MAIN DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES

- To deliver a programme of commissioning (including procurement activity) and transformation projects, providing ownership, leadership and expertise across the commissioning cycle to ensure high quality services, desired outcomes and improved efficiencies.
- To embed effective project, change and risk management frameworks throughout the commissioning cycle.
- To build and lead cross-functional teams (including Procurement, Legal, Finance, the Contract's Team and Children's Services colleagues) through direct line management and Matrix management to ensure that maximum value from commissioning, transformation projects are achieved.
- To support the development of service improvement, transformation and commercial awareness in service directorates and across the Commissioning Directorate.
- To proactively develop and manage markets in order to meet current and future service needs.
- To embed commercial considerations into each phase of the commissioning cycle, ensuring that market interest and capacity are understood and shaped and that maximum value is derived from sourcing activity and opportunities for efficiencies or savings are realised.
- To ensure that commissioning activity is aligned to political, strategic and financial drivers and priorities and that decision makers are effectively engaged.
- To ensure that stakeholders and service users are effectively engaged and involved in service improvement, transformation and commissioning activity.
- To manage risks and ensure compliance in relation to procurement, legal and financial requirements, the Constitution (WCC, RBKC and HF) governance arrangements and best practice.
- To ensure that effective performance management and contract management frameworks are Embedded and result in strong service and commercial delivery and mitigation of service or vendor related risks.
- To embed effective forward planning and to proactively identify opportunities for service and market development and aligned category and commissioning strategies.
- To lead and manage the end-to end delivery of the commissioning cycle:
- Assess: To proactively initiate commissioning and transformation activity based on robust analysis, ensuring that decisions are evidence based and congruent with wider drivers and priorities. Specifically to ensure the delivery of effective and robust spend analysis, market and vendor analysis, business performance analysis, need and customer analysis, service best practice and benchmarking analysis and alternative delivery and service model analysis to inform evidence based commissioning and transformation strategies/plans.
- Plan: To strategically shape and identify credible target outcomes as well as service design and delivery models within effective commissioning strategies and plans to drive innovation, saving propositions and service improvement. To underpin target outcomes with the development of robust performance management frameworks.
- Deliver: To deliver commissioning and transformation strategies and plans through the delivery of robust market development, technical procurement, service implementation/contract mobilisation, performance management, savings and vfm realisation and change and outcome delivery.
- Review: To ensure that effective performance management and contract management frameworks are Embedded and result in strong service and commercial delivery. To ensure that service outcomes are routinely evaluated, monitored and delivered and identified savings and value for money is realised. To review wider category and vendor outcomes and to feed intelligence into future commissioning and transformation decision making.

A flexible resourcing structure will be adopted across the Directorate to enable a greater focus on efficient and strategic resource management. As such the post holder will have their performance and development overseen by one Head of Service within the Children's Commissioning Directorate and their project delivery overseen by a Portfolio Manager involved in the project or programme (these may be multiple depending on the projects or programs).