What makes the perfect lead member?

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It may seem difficult to believe, but some councils still think of children's services as a "bit of a backwater" and see the lead member for children's service as custodian of all the "fluffy stuff". So says David Simmonds, lead member for Hillingdon and chair of the Local Government Association's children and young people board.

Only the other day, he was chatting to a female lead member for children's services who firmly believes she only got the role because it was "seen as a bit of a girl's job" at her council, he says. But he admits this kind of attitude is increasingly rare.

High-profile tragedies involving children's social care - such as the Peter Connelly case in Haringey - have provided stark reminders of how seriously the role of lead member for children's services must be taken.

"People have forgotten that both the lead member and leader of Haringey Council resigned immediately after the Baby Peter report was published in 2008," says Simmonds. "There is now a far greater expectation of responsibility on the lead member for children's services."

He has been a lead member for children's services as well as holding senior education and children's services roles for the last 14 years, so he has seen the role evolve. Few would dare dismiss it as "fluffy" now.

"The quality of lead members has also been on an upward curve," he says. "More lead members now have the attitude of 'I want to know how to do my job really well'."

Roles and responsibilities

The role of lead member, along with that of director of children's services, was created in the Children Act 2004 to ensure top-tier councils had people in place who were politically and professionally responsible for children's services, which includes the welfare of looked-after children.

The role is subject to statutory guidance, but this allows for considerable flexibility depending on the culture of a council and personality of the lead member.

"Some councils will want their lead member to have more of a focus as a champion of children," explains Simmonds, who was involved in drafting the updated statutory guidance for lead members in 2012. "Others will look for more of a scrutiny role to challenge decisions. The guidance needs to be flexible to meet their individual needs."

Flexibility is also needed to adapt to different circumstances. For example, at times of intense austerity, Simmonds reveals he has been called on to approve every potential new appointment as a way of keeping costs down.

With local elections looming, some councils may be in for a change of administration with the ruling party tasked with appointing a new person to take on the role. So what should they be looking for?

Characteristics such as strong communication, political acumen and "substantive knowledge" of the brief were identified as key skills in 2008 research by the National Foundation for Educational Research.

The report - The Role of Lead Member for Children's Services - found the most effective post holders were also those who had a relationship based on "trust and mutual respect" with their director of children's services (DCS).

This combination of skills is vital, agrees one of England's longest-serving lead members for children's services, Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council's Ken Meeson.

He has held the lead member for children's services role since it was created by the 2004 act. For about two decades before that, he held similar senior education and children's social services posts at the council. Meeson is also a trustee of the National Children's Bureau and National Youth Agency.

Even when he became leader of the council in 2011, he retained the role. "It's something I've been involved with for a long time. I decided that it was too difficult to let go," he explains. "It's more likely that I'll hand over the leadership than the lead member for children's services role."

It is a political role and subject to political pressure, but that may not be such an issue where one party has been in charge for a long time. In Solihull, for example, Meeson's party, the Conservatives, has either been in control of the council or the largest party since 1973, which has helped ensure good relations with senior officers.

"We have had that time to grow the relationship. Also, there is less worry among officers that the political stance of the council will keep changing," he says.

Even in areas where parties jostle to hang on to a slim majority, children's services is rarely a hot topic on the campaign trail, a matter of frustration for Simmonds.

"How often does someone on the doorstep say 'safeguarding is the most important issue to me'?," he asks. "Publicly, it's almost invisible. No one notices it until it goes wrong - and even then it often doesn't make much difference politically. In Haringey, the Baby Peter situation made no difference politically, yet if you don't collect the bins or fill in potholes, residents get annoyed."

Unfortunately, this means children's services can be more likely to fall victim to cuts when it comes to setting budgets, with local politicians keen to preserve those services voters do notice.

Lead members have a key role in standing up for vital safeguarding, family support and early intervention, and in doing so there is no doubt the relationship between lead member and DCS is vital to ensuring success.

For Sherry Malik, former director of children's services and adults at Hounslow and now an executive coach and consultant, this relationship should be based on the "principle of no surprises".

"What you do not want is the lead member finding out about an issue from somewhere else," she says.

The relationship also needs to be challenging, she adds: "You want to be kept on your toes by the lead member. If you are saying everything is okay, you need a lead member to ask 'how do you know that is the case?'"

For a DCS and lead member who are in post for many years, the relationship can even seem like a "marriage," says Andrew Webb, immediate past president of the Association of Directors of Children's Services (ADCS). This was how he and one lead member described their relationship, "which obviously caused a lot of mirth" among their colleagues. "It's a serious point though," he adds. "You need to invest in the good times so you have something in the bank for the bad times."

Recent research by the National College for Teaching and Leadership identified a DCS's relationship with a lead member as "the most vital peer relationship" in their job.

Informal approach

Meeson agrees communication skills are vital, particularly when it comes to being a "corporate parent" responsible for the welfare of children in the care of the local authority.

In Solihull, he has made sure meetings with children in care, either through the corporate parenting group or events, are kept informal and centred around the children.

"Last month, for example, we met a group of looked-after children at the Snowdome (in nearby Tamworth). So there I was tobogganing and then I got snowballed by them. It was great fun," he says.

This informal approach has helped break down barriers between politicians and children, and encouraged looked-after children to be more forthcoming about improvements needed, he says.

One issue children told Meeson about was the complex red tape involved in having a sleepover with a friend. As a result, responsibility for this was handed over to foster carers, who can now sanction this instantly.

Being able to communicate with young people in this way, in addition to juggling political pressures and challenging DCSs' decisions, takes time to master, says Meeson, who adds that mistakes are inevitable in the early days of the role.

"When I started, I could be rather too critical of officers who were probably doing their best. I was a little bit aggressive and I've learned since that you gain more by being more understanding and treating them as equals," he says.

For those new to the role, support is at hand from organisations such as the Local Government Association, which provides formal support as well as staging a raft of conferences and events.

One of those thrown in at the deep end was Brighton & Hove Council's lead member Sue Shanks. She was appointed as lead member just a day after becoming a councillor for the first time in 2011, when her political party, the Green Party, took control of the council.

She also admits she made mistakes in her early days, in particular deciding to axe the educational welfare officer budget but keep school music funding. Both areas had been earmarked for cuts in the Green Party-controlled council's first budget.

"I wasn't convinced from what I'd seen around the country that educational welfare officers were worth arguing to save. The director was saying that schools do this themselves," says Shanks.

"But I hadn't really made the link between attendance and performance, particularly for our disadvantaged children. In hindsight, I wouldn't have agreed that saving."

She says she has learned from the experience and is now "more aware of the need to protect those services for disadvantaged people".

Some lead members fall into the trap of focusing on just one aspect of children's services, particularly if they have a specific professional experience within children's services or a track record of campaigning on a specific issue, says the ADCS's Webb.

"Occasionally you can get a bias," he says. "The portfolio is broad and if you come to it with a specific view about schools or children in care, you can inadvertently be biased towards some of your areas of interest."

Shanks, who is a former youth work manager and youth work academic, admits her background has influenced her decisions. But she sees that as a strength, because it enabled her to argue to protect the city's youth services funding from the sort of savage cuts that have been seen elsewhere in the country.

"It was from an area that I didn't want to be cut and that may have skewed what we did. But it seemed to me that I knew what it was and its value and therefore I could argue for it," she says.

Another relatively inexperienced lead member is Dick Madden, who has only been a councillor for three years and a lead member for the past year.

But unlike Shanks, he was eased into the lead member role, serving first as deputy lead member for children's services for a year.

His specific area of expertise, as a former senior police officer investigating child protection cases and child murders, was also seen as a strength for Essex, which in recent years has been subject to damning Ofsted reports into its safeguarding children's services.

As a deputy, he was tasked specifically with scrutinising performance figures and, as lead member, has continued to focus on the quality of the council's child protection services.

"On international social work day, I went down to see the social work team, brought them some cream cakes and talked to them," he says. "It's important to meet staff and ask them whether what is happening on the ground correlates with what I am being told by the DCS about improvements taking place."

Ofsted certainly believes Madden's stance has been effective. Last month, Essex received a good rating across all areas, including management and leadership, in Ofsted's single inspection report of the county's child protection and looked-after children's services.

Madden says his experience over the past two years as deputy and lead member in Essex shows the role is far from "fluffy". "Any council that thinks that does so at their peril," he says. "If the bases are not covered, then you will be caught out."

TRAINING, SUPPORT AND USEFUL RESOURCES

Leadership training

One of the main sources of training and development for lead members of children's services is a two-day Leadership Academy course offered by the Local Government Association (LGA). The political leadership in children's services programme is delivered by lead members, LGA and Children's Improvement Board staff and includes guest speakers, such as representatives from Ofsted. Issues covered include education policy, the statutory role of lead members, strategic commissioning and child protection. Find out more at www.local.gov.uk

Essential knowledge

The LGA has also published a comprehensive set of "Must Know" guidance to help lead members for children's services get to grips with the wide range of subject areas their brief covers. This series of downloadable documents covers issues such as corporate parenting, safeguarding, education, children's health, early years education, disabilities, youth services and maintaining services amid budget cuts, and can be found in the Children and Young People section of the LGA website. www.local.gov.uk/children-and-young-people

Coping with the unexpected

Directors of children's services training body the Virtual Staff College, chief executives' organisation Solace and the LGA run a scenario planning group activity, which creates situations for senior managers and councillors that are different from the day-to-day running of children's services. The aim is to improve strategic skills and abilities, and deal with difficult, unexpected situations. www.virtualstaffcollege.co.uk

Mentoring support

The LGA offers an informal mentoring programme that pairs up lead members for children's services who then work together. The service is highly flexible and can be employed to help lead members tackle a specific issue or for more general support and involve regular meetings or simply having someone at the end of the phone or on email. It can involve twinning up two new lead members or matching a new lead member with someone experienced in the role. www.local.gov.uk

Research into the role

The National Foundation for Educational Research took an in-depth look at the role of the lead member for children's services in 2008. Its report examines the challenges lead members face and the key characteristics they need to be a success in the role. It highlights the importance of communication skills and developing a good relationship with the director of children's services. The report can be downloaded at www.nfer.ac.uk/publications.

Improving children's health

In April 2013, councils took on responsibility for delivering and commissioning public health services for children. The Department of Health and LGA published a briefing paper last year setting out a lead member's role in improving children's health and how they can support services such as school nursing teams. The document can be accessed via www.gov.uk/government/publications.