West of Scotland Housing Association (WSHA) was founded in 1965. The association provides around 4,200 homes across the West of Scotland. WSHA has a wide range of homes to suit customers at every stage of life including tenemental flats, family homes, amenity properties and sheltered housing.
DTP was commissioned to assist WSHA in conducting an independent review into the Finance Function, with a view to improving the internal customer experience for service users, and at the same time identifying factors (and potential changes) which might lead to enhancements in the overall financial management of the organisation.
We approach the review in stages, as shown below:
| Look at individual roles and job descriptions | We undertook this as part of the desk-top analysis and we use this to make comparisons with similar organisations. |
| Look at current tasks and processes | We looked at this as part of our desk-top analysis and we considered how these compared with similar organisations. We also explored these matters in structured interviews with members of the team and with users of finance services provided by the team. |
| Benchmark with other similar organisations. | We considered our findings and made observations taking account of our experience of working with other organisations of similar size. |
| Identify inefficient and ineffective tasks and processes. | During the review we used the analysis and the interviews to identify tasks and processes which we felt needed to be improved and we made recommendations regarding the relative priority of these. |
| Consider more efficient processes. | We made recommendations, we proposed discussion on how best to go about making any improvements – considering internal and external resourcing. |
| Consider what new roles would be required. | We considered options for change and made recommendations for consideration. |
On concluding our review, we reported on our findings and we made a series of recommendations, for consideration. WSHA concluded that the proposals and the recommendations should be progressed as part of a targeted action plan of improvements.
Brian Gannon, Chief Executive