Public private partnerships

There has been an explosion in recent years in the need for different parts of the public sector to work more effectively with each other and to partner with private sector companies in the delivery of public services. We see this need in the formation of Local Strategic Partnerships (LSPs) and Local Area Agreements (LAAs) set up to tackle issues of economic decline and social deprivation in communities around the country. And we also see it in formally contracted PFI deals and other Public Private Partnerships set up to rebuild our local and national infrastructure of roads, schools and hospitals.

Our experience is that these complex multi-agency relationships can quickly run into the sand at an operational level. They become:

• tied up in contractual complexity
• stuck in operational bureaucracy
• indecisive – with milestones missed or delayed
• bound by structural and cultural silos, with poor communication and little collective leadership
• demoralised – as the scale of the task takes its toll.

Creating successful partnership working across the public and private sector involves aligning different cultures to speed up decision making and delivery. We help clients change behaviours, un-stick relationships and break these cultural and procedural barriers.

We work at the highest levels in Central and Local Government, and with their private sector partners in sectors such as construction, highways and IT services. Clients who have benefited from our work in public-public and public private partnership include those shown to the right.