Introducing Michael Barber
Welcome back to A Load of BS after a short Summer break away. I hope you've all had time away from work and feel rested and energised for the challenges ahead.
Talking of big challenges, my guest to kick off the Autumn season of BS has made a career of facing and disentangling them, at the heart of British government, over many years. He is Sir Michael Barber, the man who Tony Blair appointed to create and then run his Delivery Unit.
He has written extensively on the subject of delivery, including the below, which I highly recommend for anyone interested in problem solving and strategy!
Michael's heart is in education. He originally trained as a teacher and worked in schools in Britain and Zimbabwe for many years before working at the National Union for Teachers. Then in 1997, he joined the UK Government to become the Chief Adviser on School Standards. Then in 2001, Michael founded the PM's Delivery Unit in No 10 - the first of its kind in the world and something which has been since replicated across the globe.
As Michael says, if you can organise humans to solve problems in government, you can do it anywhere. So here's your primer on the art of Deliverology.
Show notes
What Scafell Pike walk teaches you about problem solving
Why did Tony Blair ask Michael to set up his Delivery Unit?
What was the civil service doing before the introduction of the Delivery Unit?
Changing real people’s lives in a very visible, meaningful way
How boring and radical government must hang together
Why delivery is like a soap opera as well as a documentary
The importance of a guiding coalition in government to make policy happen
Government by routine vs. by spasm
Buy-in is overrated, or why you don’t need it at the beginning
Reaching irreversibility
How intrusive press blurs the line between transparency and privacy
Excuses that ministers throw up to resist change
What Michael advised Boris Johnson in 2019
The next frontier in Delivery – using real-time data
Next time with Steve Martin
In the next episode of A Load of BS, I welcome Robert Cialdini's great disciple, friend and co-author Steve Martin to the show.
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Till next time,
Daniel
Sir Michael Barber on the science of Delivery