An interview with Erica Goodsir, Corporate Development Manager, at Pittwater Council in NSW.
Erica Goodsir believes that Local Government faces many challenges particularly in the field of Human Resources. As the Corporate Development Manager in Pittwater Council, her responsibilities include human resource management. She believes that Local Government will have to move quickly as strong pressures are developing and she is well qualified to speak on the issue.
Her Human Resources career spans private, Local and State Government authorities. She has been at Pittwater Council in NSW for about nine years. Not solely confined to Human Resource Management, she has also worked in straight management. As well as managing HR, her current responsibilities in Business Planning include Council’s Management Plan and the Pittwater economy, which gives her an excellent understanding of the Council’s business and its human resources requirements Erica is very interested in the impact of generational change that is currently affecting the nation.
“The baby boomers are about to retire and it is going to start to causing shortages in the workforce,” she said. “We are already experiencing labour shortages of talented staff in key fields such as town planners. It is expected that the workforce will expand very slowly over the next ten years and there is going to be a real battle for talent in future years among different organisations. It will also mean that Generation X will be able to move quickly up into higher positions as the boomers leave.”
Erica said this generation and the one following will be far more transient with organisations having to fight harder to keep staff. “Generation X are used to instability and they are not worried about it,” she said.
There is an upside with many retiring boomers becoming available for part time contracting to help out with the labour shortages. Employers will find that they have to be more creative and flexible in order to keep people who are much more serious about their work/life balance. Stimulation, variety of work, new challenges, robust feedback and speedy recognition will all attract the newer workforce. Employers will also have to provide safer and more pleasant work environments. Designing work on a project management basis allows employers to create measurable project outcomes for telecommuters and to be able to hire for specific skills needed at the time on a shorter term basis. It also facilitates the workers moving in and out of different organisations and building on their skills and experience.
Portability of skills and life long learning are becoming a major requirement for the new worker. Erica Goodsir believes the challenges offer enormous possibilities in Local Government. “Pittwater is a progressive Council that has won a number of awards over the years and it is an exciting place to work,” she said.
At Pittwater Council, there is a strong emphasis on electronic services and transactions. Field staff are provided with Personal Digital Assistant or palm pilot which give them a phone, access to their email, appointments and Council’s document systems all in one reducing the need to spend time in the office. People can also be easily set up to work from home with access to Council’s electronic systems.
In Human Resources, Erica believes that all processing functions should become electronic with HR staff concentrating on people management, what is needed culturally and learning. The Intranet has major potential for HR Managers to provide an autonomous and current learning tool and to drive electronic processing of HR services.
For Local Government in particular, she sees a trend towards more administrative systems being shared across different Councils. In New South Wales, she also envisages a much stronger push for outsourcing of services to contractors with a distinction between people who work for Local Government.
