16 July 2009 – Publication of DWP research report 567: partnerships insight research

A research report is published today by the Department for Work and Pensions which provides an insight into how stakeholder partners view their working relationships with Jobcentre Plus. Stakeholder partners represent a wide range of JCP customers and have an interest in what Jobcentre Plus does and how this  affects their customer groups.

The project employed a mixed methodology and was conducted in two stages. The first stage included qualitative interviews with members of the Jobcentre Plus Customer Representative Group Forum (CRGF) as well as some of the Chief Executives and equivalents in these organisations. The CRGF focuses on the current Jobcentre Plus benefit delivery system, planned developments and related customer service issues.

The second stage, was a quantitative telephone survey of 390 local stakeholder partners, usually with the member of staff who has the most contact with Jobcentre Plus. These local stakeholders were often local manifestations of the organisations that were contacted during the first stage. Follow up interviews were then conducted with 40 local partners to further explore issues arising from the quantitative survey.

Key findings of the research:

Findings from the CRGF

• The Forum was highly praised as a welcome initiative from Jobcentre Plus
• Key strengths of the Forum were that it was seen to be open and honest, and progressive and informative
• Jobcentre Plus representatives were praised for their willingness to ensure the Forum was productive, and also for the presence of senior Jobcentre Plus staff
• Concern from some members that Jobcentre Plus had too much control over the Forum agenda
• Communication between the Forum and Jobcentre Plus was praised on the whole, however there was minor criticism about the occasional lack of detailed information that Jobcentre Plus would send out, and
• There was concern amongst Forum members that information or action points from the Forum could sometimes be lost or diluted within Jobcentre Plus.

It should be noted that despite attempts to include all CRG Forum members, there were a number of members who were unable to participate, or chose to opt out. For this reason, the views expressed do not comprehensively cover all Forum members.

Findings from survey of local partners

• 77% of the 390 local stakeholder partners questioned were satisfied with the working relationship they had with Jobcentre Plus
• 85% deemed the partnership with Jobcentre Plus to be successful. One quarter of these said it was very successful
• An area where there is room for improvement is Jobcentre Plus’ flexibility. 45% of respondents rated Jobcentre Plus as only fair or poor for being flexible. This related to information sharing (or lack of), and strict adherence to Jobcentre Plus/DWP processes
• 86% agreed that Jobcentre Plus was responsive to their queries. Having a named contact at Jobcentre Plus appears to offer clear benefits for the Partnership in terms of communication, perceived success and overall satisfaction, and
• Partners were asked to identify one thing Jobcentre Plus could do to improve the partnership. One in five said that no improvements were necessary, whilst the main reasons given by others included having more locally orientated services and priorities (9%), improving communication (8%) and having a better understanding of their organisation (8%).

Notes to Editors

1. The DWP research report “Partnerships Insight” will be published on 9 July, 2009. A copy of the research is available at: http://research.dwp.gov.uk/asd/asd5/rports2009-2010/rrep589.pdf
2. The research was conducted between October 2008 and January 2009. It  included depth face to face interviews with CRGF members and CEO equivalents and a quantitative telephone survey with local partners and some follow up interviews.
3. British Market Research Bureau (BMRB) conducted the research.  The report authors are Anthony Allen, Dr Andrew Thomas, Barry Fong, Sinead Lawless and Rosie McLeod.

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