A story of. Ordinary People, Doing Extraordinary Things

Transcription

1 A story of Ordinary People, Doing Extraordinary Things Year in Review

2 Once upon a time Two leaders, one bright future It s the start of a new chapter for us here at NCHA, as we say a fond farewell to our CEO Mike Andrews. Mike s been part of the NCHA family for 30 years and CEO for the last 11. As only our second-ever CEO, he s helped us become the thriving organisation we are today and made a real difference to lives right across our communities. As he relaxes into much-deserved retirement we all wish him the very best. Stepping into Mike s shoes is our Director of Assets and Compliance Paul Moat. Paul beat stiff external competition to land the role, and he brings with him the energy and ideas to help us shape an even stronger, brighter future. It feels like a lifetime ago that I first walked through the doors of NCHA. The organisation I m leaving behind is very different to the one I joined, but it s still driven by that same determination to make life fairer for everyone, no matter what obstacles they face. I m so proud to have been a part of the journey and I know that led by Paul, NCHA will go on to achieve even more incredible things for our communities. Retiring CEO, Mike Andrews It really is a privilege to take on Mike s legacy and steer the NCHA ship into new waters. We ve got a fantastic new structure which I know is going to empower us to improve even more lives. Over the next few pages you ll see we ve carried on the fairytale theme that went down so well at our last staff conference. It captured the spirit that s made us so strong championing the vulnerable, fighting for what s right and always striving for the happy ever after. I m so proud to see the fantastic feedback we ve been getting and I know we can make this another year to remember. New CEO, Paul Moat Championing the vulnerable, fighting for what s right and striving for the happy ever after

3 Getting our castle in order A diverse, dynamic board Across our sector, there s a big push to make Board teams more diverse, better representing the communities they serve in terms of race, age and gender. We re proud to say, at NCHA, we re already home to a diverse board, bringing together a whole range of perspectives and experience. The team is led by our chair, Claire Winfield, who has worked with some of society s most vulnerable people for her entire career and is also CEO at Sight Support Derbyshire. A new structure for a stronger NCHA This year we ve been making some changes to the way we re structured. The idea wasn t to save money or to downsize, but to be in the best possible shape to improve people s lives. We wanted to be fit for the future, whatever it throws at us from welfare reforms to funding challenges and, of course, the ever-growing demand for homes. So, we ve reorganised our teams to combine our strengths, streamline our services and simplify our processes. We re proud to be a team of over 1,000 knights going into battle to build brighter futures. People first, always By bringing the Housing directorate together with the Care and Support directorate, we ve created a Homes and Wellbeing directorate, putting all of our people-focused services in one place, with one strategy and one management team. It means all our customers, from tenants and shared owners to older people, service users, care home residents and beyond, will receive consistent, quality services from one, united team. Building a stronger property team Assets and Compliance will be joining forces with the Development and Sales directorate in September In the same way as the Homes and Wellbeing directorate, Development and Assets will bring a family of service together, in this case our property-based work. So, from inception to day-to-day maintenance, we ll have a joined-up, robust, efficient team. The resources we really need Finally, what was our Corporate Services directorate is now our Resources directorate. It includes new Business Transformation and Business Intelligence teams, both created to shape our organisation in a more strategic way and deliver big, ambitious corporate plans over the coming years. During 2017/2018 volunteers contributed over 8,000 hours of their time to NCHA providing additional support for our customers

4 Mirror, mirror on the wall... Stakeholder survey We work closely with a whole range of stakeholders to support and provide services for our tenants. From solicitors, consultants and contractors to the government, local authorities and regulatory bodies, they all play a part in our story. Early in 2018 we asked an independent consultant to survey our stakeholders and find out their thoughts, perceptions and experiences of NCHA s brand, values, mission and reputation. In all, 19 anonymous, face-to-face interviews were carried out and we re happy to say the results were very positive. Each stakeholder was asked which words sprung to mind when they thought of NCHA. Between them they listed 54 words, and the overwhelming majority were positive. In fact, the most frequent were: caring, professional, established and partnership. Reflecting on the work we do Motivated, hard-working and committed When asked what our values might be, the stakeholders said: commitment, conscience, genuine and well run. They were all asked to describe our strengths and people repeatedly mentioned our staff, characterising them as motivated, hard-working and committed. They also described a sense of family and togetherness, recognising that staff stay with us for a long time. Encouragingly, many of the stakeholders felt they had a positive relationship with us a relationship they descried as: happy, good, positive, strong, excellent, open, honest and trusting. Even better, every single person involved said they d happily recommend us. We couldn t really ask for more. Genuine and well run. It s the sort of employer that generates loyalty they don t lose people and that s got to say something about them as an employer and the way they treat employees. I think they provide quality housing, excellent services they re a very caring institution actually. And I think that s the case right from the top down to staff. They re genuinely about keeping the social purpose of social housing, so really strong and not losing sight of the really vulnerable communities and groups that they originally set out to support. They ll do some of the difficult stuff that others won t

5 Written in the stars Glowing reviews from the people who matter most On a quest to be clear Introducing a new set of values for our entire team Making our customers happy is at the heart of what we do, so we re really pleased to announce the results of our latest STAR survey. STAR is a voluntary approach to measuring tenant satisfaction across the social housing sector, designed to find out what people think about the places they live and the support they re getting. We sent out questionnaires to 1,999 NCHA tenants. Of those 668 were completed. Together, they show what percentage of people were satisfied with different aspects of our service. Here s what they said 91% 88% 86% 85% 85% 83% SATISFIED WITH THE OVERALL SERVICES PROVIDED BY NCHA. SATISFIED WITH CONTACTING NCHA USING THE 0800 PHONE NUMBER. SATISFIED THAT NCHA RENT PROVIDES VALUE FOR MONEY. SATISFIED WITH THE OVERALL QUALITY OF THEIR HOME. SATISFIED WITH THEIR NEIGHBOURHOOD AS A PLACE TO LIVE. SATISFIED WITH THE WAY NCHA DEALS WITH REPAIRS AND MAINTENANCE. We ve been working closely with colleagues and customers to find out what good performance from NCHA means to them. The results have helped us shape a new set of values, describing who we are, how we work and what people can expect from us. They re called CLEAR, and they launched in April C is for Caring: We care about what we do and the way we do it. L is for Lean: We learn, improve and change to deliver great services. E is for Enthusiastic: We are engaged and motivated to make a difference. We ve attached positive and negative indicators to each of the values, so we can see how well we re doing, and every member of staff has been sent a booklet explaining how these work. We ve also reviewed our recruitment and performance management processes to build the new CLEAR values in. A is for Accountable: We are answerable for what we do and don t do. R is for Resilient: We are ready to respond to opportunities and challenges

6 Staff in shining armour Northamptonshire team named as outstanding by the Care Quality Commission Our CLEAR values An example of our CLEAR values in practice came with some very positive ratings from the Care Quality Commission (CQC) this year. We always work hard to make sure our registered care services meet the CQC s guidelines and aim to be listed by them as Good or Outstanding across the board. But, understandably, Outstanding ratings are hard to come by, so when our care and support package at Patrick Court in Northamptonshire made the grade, we were delighted. It s a Transforming Care service, which moves adults with complex needs out of long-stay hospitals and into their own homes. The team provides personal care and support, helping people develop their independence and involvement in the community. It was only opened in 2016, in partnership with the NHS, so to be recognised so quickly as an Outstanding service really is an impressive achievement

7 A thriving kingdom Proud to be building even more new homes Whistling while we work We re just as committed as ever to helping provide much-needed housing across the East Midlands, because everyone deserves a place to call home. We re providing 300 new homes every year. We re creating 150 homes for rent each year. We re creating 50 to 75 shared ownership homes each year. We re delivering development services to external clients through Pitch Development Services, our joint consultancy with Longhurst Group. It s been another busy year for our Property Services team, who ve been taking calls from across our communities and carrying out both emergency and planned repairs. This year we ve spent over 11m on maintenance. 3.3m of that work was carried out by our own tradespeople and engineers. We received 97,437 property-related calls from our customers % of all those repairs were completed on time. We ve also made 136 home adaptations to help customers with disabilities. 185 FOR AFFORDABLE RENT FOR SHARED OWNERSHIP FOR SPECIALIST HOUSING FOR SALE THROUGH PELHAM HOMES Between April 2017 and April 2018 we built 301 new homes 11 12

8 Protecting people across the realm How the right support is preparing our communities for whatever comes their way Listening to our communities While lots of housing associations have cut back on community consultation to meet tough budgets, we re proud to be listening to our tenants more than ever. We recently passed the Tenant Participation and Advisory Service s accreditation process with flying colours, showing how well we re doing at involving our communities in decision making and putting feedback into action. Creating new career support We ve already worked with 40 tenants, achieving some great results: 3 people have been offered jobs 3 people have secured CV-boosting volunteer placements, with the Furniture Project, Salvation Army and Cancer Research UK 11 people have had job interviews 6 people have gained new skills and qualifications Helping more people stay out of rent arrears This year, we ve achieved our lowest rent arrears ever just 3%. It s thanks to the hard work of our Income Team, as well as colleagues from across Allocations, Customer Contact, Rents, Estates, Anti-social Behaviour and Tenant Involvement. They ve all worked closely with our social and affordable rent residents to make more payments possible. In fact, our arrears have been coming down year by year since 2000, when they were at 8%. It s a really positive sign that our tenants are getting the support they need to manage their finances. Keeping arrears low also makes us more robust and financially secure as an organisation, so we re ready to provide whatever our communities need. Earlier this year we launched a new scheme called Workwise, helping our tenants get back into work by giving practical support and advice, as well as putting people in touch with external agencies and services

9 Preparing people for change More ways we re supporting our communities Fire safety in the wake of Grenfell Preparations for Universal Credit Like most housing associations, we ve made raising awareness of Universal Credit a key priority. We wanted our customers to understand what it meant for them and their families, so we designed a campaign to raise the profile of these benefit changes. By spreading the word we were also able to make important early interventions, helping people get ready for the change. The campaign included: A quirky information booklet that doubled as a useful workbook. A customer roadshow so we could talk to people face to face. Putting the latest information on our website and social media feeds. A live Facebook Universal Credit Q&A session. The hard work is already paying off. Early impact assessments show that the campaign will limit the effect of these major benefit changes on both our customers lives and our financial stability. Helping people get to grips with benefit changes. Back in June 2017, the Grenfell Tower fire caused shock, sadness and anger across the UK. In its wake we ve worked hard to review our fire safety processes, making sure we re giving our tenants the safe homes and sound advice they need. We ve created a dedicated address for reporting fire safety concerns firesafe@ncha.org.uk and we re making sure we respond quickly to every message we get. We ve also been holding fire safety events across our region, giving tenants the opportunity to talk to us about their concerns and get practical advice. We ve carried out a review of all of the buildings we own and manage. It showed we have 382 buildings that need fire risk assessments and 143 that need annual reviews. We re pleased to say they re all up to date and none of our high-rise buildings have cladding similar to Grenfell Tower s. Finally, we ve also put together a new fire safety booklet and sent it out to all of our tenants that s over 6,000 copies. It explains our responsibilities and gives advice on fire safety and escape plans. If you d like a copy, please us on firesafe@ncha.org.uk. Bringing new fire safety advice to over 6,000 households. None of our high-rise buildings have cladding similar to Grenfell Tower s

10 Helping more people live happily ever after Upping our game in the fight against homelessness Giving help and support to those who need it most is why NCHA was founded. Staying true to that original purpose, we re working harder than ever to keep people off the streets. Joining forces Right across the country, homelessness is on the rise. Ending it here in the East Midlands is a key part of our vision and we re committed to playing a powerful part. We ve joined Homes for Cathy a group of housing associations working together to raise awareness of the needs of homeless people and create strategies to end homelessness. As part of that we re currently pulling together plans and ideas from across our Homes and Wellbeing team. Getting out on the streets As well as planning a better future, we re helping people living with homelessness. As well as providing temporary accommodation and resettlement support for households experiencing homelessness in Nottingham, Loughborough, Derbyshire and Leicester, we re giving outreach support on the streets of Nottingham and Leicestershire. Tackling domestic abuse We know there s a complex link between homelessness and domestic abuse, so we re providing specialist domestic abuse support services in Nottingham, Derbyshire and Lincolnshire, as well as helping Women s Aid charities to do the same across the wider Nottinghamshire region. We ve been accredited by the Domestic Abuse Housing Alliance and we re putting together an action plan to raise awareness of the problem and support people experiencing it. Fighting poverty At the heart of the homelessness crisis is the struggle to lift people out of poverty. We re determined to make a difference and this year we ll be reviewing the way our Homes and Wellbeing team provides tenancy support services. We offer a range of support for people experiencing problems, including debt advice and specialist homelessness support. We also have a welfare fund and an employability pilot project that s helping people secure better paid jobs. Alongside this, we re hoping to open new doors by reviewing our allocations policy, the types of tenancy we offer and the support we provide to new tenants. This could make more households eligible for an NCHA home. Supporting people at risk of eviction We re reviewing our policy on evictions, as well as how we handle them in practice. As a team, we want to adopt a supportthen-enforce approach, giving people the best possible chance of staying in their homes. The duty to refer aspect of the Homelessness Reduction Act 2017 means it s likely that more households facing eviction will be referred to us from local authorities. So, we ve been working with the National Housing Federation to look at how to prepare and what we can do to support the individuals and families who come to us

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