CPD works with a number of public sector organisations, including local authorities, police authorities, and passenger transport bodies to effect organisational change and improvement through people.

The challenges facing these organisations are significant.  The need to do more with less has never been greater, and there is an increasing emphasis on the role of public bodies in actively engaging with, and shaping, the communities of the future.  All of this means major changes in the way these organisations operate, including working more closely with partners in problem solving and service delivery.

Public organisations are used to the challenge of system and process change, but the extent of the challenges that face them requires fundamental structure and culture change too, and that's even more challenging.  In addition to all that, public bodies are faced with the further challenge of responding to additional burdens which are placed on them.  The area of Equality & Diversity is just one of these.

Our job is to lighten that load and to help clients find a way to do what they need to do while giving service users value for money and a continuously improved service.

While all organisations have a duty to work within the law governing how they recruit, manage and develop their people, and deliver their services to their customers, public bodies have additional responsibilities.

The statutory Race, Gender, Age, Religion or Belief, Sexual Orientaion and Disability Equality Duties mean that organisations have to proactively ensure that the effects of all their policies and strategies does not have a detrimental effect on people in any of these categories.  These organisations must equality impact assess their policies, and produce Equality Schemes for each duty, to demonstrate to staff, customers and other stakeholders the actions they are taking to ensure equality of opportunity and service provision.  That's a lot of extra work to deliver in a time of increasingly constrained resources.