Chris Last
Head of Civil Service Human Resources
How did you tackle the biggest challenges facing your organisation in 2014?
Civil Service HR has faced a number of challenges this year as we continue to develop as a profession and as a function – from ensuring we deliver some of the big processes that the civil service relies on, such as running the CS Jobs portal and expanding our recruitment services, to working with the Civil Service Group on ‘Civil Service Reform: a Progress Review’ and ensuring the HR profession is well placed to support the continuing reforms of the civil service.
What has made tackling these challenges possible is the hard work that has gone into increasing the capability of people working in the HR profession across government, and a real focus on bringing together the HR leadership community to work on these challenges together.
What are your department’s top priorities in the last months before the general election?
Ensuring Civil Service HR continues to deliver against our reform plan commitments, particularly in the four priority areas of commercial, digital, project management and leadership. We play a key role in supporting professions to develop their curriculums, in providing access to development opportunities for all staff to upskill themselves, and in continuing to build and communicate the offer to all staff. We now have HR Business Partners embedded in a number of key cross-government professions, working with heads of profession to continue to build capability, talent management and succession planning at a professional level.
What’s your favourite Christmas treat? And what makes you say: ‘Bah, humbug!’?
My favourite Christmas treat is watching old war films on the TV. The Christmas decorations in shops before the start of December really make me think ‘Bah, humbug!