Scottish Executive human resources (HR) chief Paul Pagliari has declared himself “excited” about the £3m new HR system in place at the government.
Formerly with the Home Office in London, the director of change and corporate services has overseen a two-year modernisation programme at the Scottish Executive, which employs 8,000 people.
The number of HR professionals has been slashed from 150 to 100, and more responsibility has been given to line managers.
The new system, which also allows employees to monitor their own online records, and enables the remaining HR staff to take on more strategic responsibilities, went live last week.
Pagliari told Personnel Today: “We’ve spent the past 18 months transforming HR. I’m quite excited about it. The new system makes sure everything is managed more efficiently, in a way that transfers ownership of people management issues to line managers.”
A shared-service centre now takes care of administrative personnel, while HR business partners sit with senior managers to take a tactical look at people issues.
“It has taken almost two years to get business partners respected by line managers,” said Pagliari.
“There has been lots of training of existing staff, as well as bringing in some new people,” he added.
The programme of change cost in the region of £3m, but Pagliari believes this money will be recouped by the headcount reduction and efficiency savings across the organisation.
“Six months ago, 17% of queries were successfully dealt with first time – now we are up to 97%,” he said.
“When I came here, this project was in turmoil. Now we are in a pretty good position,” he added.
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