Few organisations are subject to the extensive level of internal and external scrutiny faced by LEAs. Internally this includes self-review, best value reviews and member scrutiny panels; externally there are full Ofsted LEA inspections, themed HMI inspection, area wide inspections, Ofsted and ALI inspections of youth, community and adult education services as well as audit commission CPA inspections. These are soon to be extended to include joint SSI / Ofsted inspections of Children’s Services.

Most LEA officers and members know the potential value of this scrutiny. They also know the burden it can produce, with the risk of distracting already hard-pressed staff from service delivery. This is where Cocentra can help. LEAs sometimes need additional capacity to meet the peaks of workload that inspections create, whether it is support for producing pre-inspection documentation or preparing a post-inspection action plan. More fundamentally, LEAs also recognise the value of support self-review and evaluation and Cocentra staff have significant expertise in this field.

Cocentra’s approach

Our services in this area include:

• Supported LEA self-review and evaluation
• LEA mini “health checks” eg a review of the effectiveness of the LEA senior management team or advisory service
• Pre-inspection support, including joint inspection planning
• Support with post inspection action planning

If you would like to discuss self review and inspection preparation further please contact jacqui@cocentra.com

Alternatively, please call 0845 009 4010 and ask to talk to Jacqui, or order a Cocentra brochure.