Chief operating officer, Efficiency and Reform Group, Cabinet Office
In a year of political and economic change, what was your highlight of 2010?
My highlight must be the way the British people used the electoral system to send a message to Westminster – a message that challenged the political parties, the political system and Whitehall. The politicians responded through successful coalition talks; and the civil service responded by helping the coalition deliver a difficult Budget and spending review in very short order. As an interested spectator for most of this period [before being recruited into my current job], I thought it was all done magnificently well, and I believe everyone involved should be proud of the part they played in helping to make history.
What is the biggest opportunity that coalition policies have created for the civil service?
The existence of the coalition has ensured that decision-making in government is more formal, which has brought back collective, cabinet-run government. In addition, the spending review has given the civil service a one-off chance to become efficient, and reform itself for all time.
What is the most challenging management task facing the civil service now?
Undoubtedly the most immediate challenge is managing the reduction in size of the civil service and public sector without hacking indiscriminately into vital public services.
Perhaps the more strategic challenge is simultaneously to be laying the foundations for the coalition's public service reform agenda, in a way that this agenda takes root now and delivers reform and scale as the public finances move back into balance.
And what’s the key to succeeding in that task?
Boldness and pace are both key: boldness, because incremental solutions are not the answer. Pace, because it is more important to make change, and then sweep up the residual issues, than it is to become paralysed by analysis before acting.
What was the best Christmas present that you’ve ever given or received? And the worst?
The worst was the first Christmas present I gave to my wife. I nearly bankrupted myself in Irish or Greek proportions to buy a designer, cashmere scarf, giftwrapped from Liberty, only for my wife not even to bother taking it home to her parents, as she thought it was a box of chocolates.
The best Christmas I have had was in 2005 when we managed to get all my family and my wife's family out to New Zealand for a mega-holiday on the South Island. And I hope to receive another best present this Christmas: a new 11-inch Apple Macbook Air (hint, hint).