Curriculum Vitae
Name:
Andrew Stephens
Summary:
- Senior manager with 20 years of experience in local government in London, including four years as assistant director for customer services.
- Proven strategic thinker – developing e-government and customer services strategies – and one of two founders of London Connects.
- successfully delivered a wide range of projects, from innovative e-government projects – APLAWS, MicroBusiness Gateway, CasWeb – to projects implementing customer services strategies – LBs Islington & Hackney.
- Sound analytical skills, including conducting research for Warwick Business School on the Beacon Councils Scheme and the use of Lean in the public sector.
- Now working as a consultant for a range of public sector organisations.
Most Recent Employment:
July 2008 to date: Consultant .
Since becoming a freelance consultant I have worked for the new Cornwall Council – helping them develop a single approach to customer services, for Enfield Homes, evaluating their customer outreach programme, for Haringey Council, reviewing and rewriting their customer service strategy, and for an English NHS Hospital Trust evaluating their Lean & Lean Six Sigma training programme.
February 2007 to August 2008: Assistant Director, Customer Services – LB Hackney.
I managed the Customer Services Division of the Customer and Corporate Services Directorate. The Division had around 80 permanent and contract staff covering four main functions, both operational and developmental: Single Front Office, Customer Care, Registrars and Public Service Promise and Registrars. Achievements included:
- Review and relaunch of Hackney’s customer services strategy –- signed off by Management Team and Cabinet.
- Redraft and launch of corporate customer care standards
- Charter Mark for Division
- Improved performance and extended opening hours of the corporate contact centre
- Transfer of Registrars to new management arrangements and transfer to the corporate contact centre
- Successful completion of CRM pilot and further implementation of CRM
- Ensured alignment of ICT strategy with customer services strategy
- Launch of Public Service Promise partnership programme with Team Hackney
Recent Employment History:
July 2004 to January 2007: Assistant Director – Customer Focus (Strategic Customer Services) L B Islington. Part-time (0.5)
I managed Strategic Customer Services (SCS) – a division of the Customer Focus Department. The Division covered four main functions: customer access and delivery development and operation of the customer contact centre (currently 90 seats); information governance – including FOI, IRT and information sharing protocols; management and development of the customer-facing technical architecture. SCS had an annual revenue budget of £5m and management of a capital programme of £2m-£3m annually. In my last appraisal I achieved the highest rating – “Highly Effective”. Contact Islington won “National Contact Centre of the Year Award -2006”.
July 2005 – March 2006: Senior Research Fellow (part-time), Operations Management Department, Warwick Business School.
I was engaged to work on a project – An evaluation of the use of Lean Methodology to support business transformation in the public sector in Scotland – funded by the Scottish Executive.
July 2004 – June 2005: Researcher (part-time), Local Government Centre, Warwick Business School
I participated for a year in an ongoing ODPM-funded project: “Evaluation of the Beacon Council Scheme” – carrying out a number of case studies across English local authorities to evaluate how effective the scheme is in raising standards across local government through sharing good practice.
2002 – 2004: e-Government Development Manager, L B Camden;
Heading up a team of up to 25 people – programme managers, project managers and developers – my role, as one of the ICT management team, was to lead on e-government strategy and development. My Team played a major role in national e-government projects.
2000 – 2002: Head of Camden Connect Team, Corporate ICT, LB Camden;
During this period I effectively led for the authority on e-Government, building the team, which later became the e-Government Development Team, from nothing. I raised the profile of e-Government in the authority, which led to the establishment of the corporate Modernising Government Group, a sub-group of the corporate management team, of which I was a member from its inception.
1998 – 2000: ICT Strategist (Emerging Technologies), Corporate ICT, LB Camden.
Having developed extensive knowledge of emerging technologies in my previous role I was invited to mainstream these projects and harness them to the Modernising Government agenda, as well as contributing to the wider ICT strategy for the Council.
1992 – 1995: Project Manager (EU Projects), Chief Executive’s Department, LB Camden & 1995 – 1998: Head of the Telematics Development Group, Leisure and Community Services, LB Camden.
During this period I managed a portfolio of projects funded from a range of EU programmes, all of which looked at the use of new technologies to improve government service delivery. Established LB Camden’s first web site.
Education:
2004: Warwick Business School: Master of Public Administration (MPA)
1977: University of Hull: BA (Hons.) 2.II in Philosophy;
1973: University College School, London: 3 “A” Levels: Biology, Maths, Physical Science;
1971: University College School, London: 10 “O” Levels;
References:
On application
Contact details:
Tel:
Mobile: 07528 607 365
e-mail:
astephens55@btinternet.com
Limited Company:
Andrew Collingwood Stephens Ltd
Company Number: 6657200
Vat Number: 937 825681