Portsmouth City Council Housing Service manages over 17,000 council owned and leasehold properties in Portsmouth and Havant making it the largest social landlord in that area. Our service includes carrying out repairs and maintenance, maximising rental income, undertaking grounds maintenance and cleaning, providing tenancy support and tackling anti social behaviour. We are proud to find innovative solutions to the challenges of service design and management. Using our unique housing management method we harness the collective brain power of our workforce and together we make our processes as effective and customer- focussed as possible.

If successful in your application you will be based at one of the seven Area Housing Offices, and will join an experienced and effective management team ensuring the highest standards of customer service are achieved when responding to our customer demands.

What is the role?

As Customer Service Manager (CSM) you will be responsible for ensuring the area office handles it's customer demands accurately and efficiently. You will measure the performance being achieved from existing processes accurately, identifying opportunity and acting on these to improve our customer experience. The CSM needs to be able to use the 'housing service management method' (see 'for more information' above) CSMs use a variety of methods to personally observe the service being delivered by frontline officers and service providers with the focus of identifying opportunities to improve our customer experience, by improving efficiency and designing out wasteful process which hinder effective service delivery. You will ensure that resources are aligned to best meet the demands of our customers. CSMs are responsible for ensuring cash desks are run in line with the Councils audit/financial rules enabling Portsmouth City Council customers to pay a variety of charges due. The role includes an element of facilities management, ensuring that the area office is well maintained and remains a safe working environment for both staff and customers. The CSM will also have direct line management responsibility for a number of office based Customer Relations Officers ensuring each member of the team has the skills, abilities and understanding to deliver the stated purposes for our services, resulting in a positive customer experience. You will ensure that the team you manage work with you and other managers to improve the customer experience.

A typical working day might include any of the following examples

Juggling your available resources in response to unexpected staff absence. Attending a meeting of the management team where you are required to brief others or work load is assigned to you. Planning your time to ensure priorities are met. Spending time with a member of your team to fully understand the remit of their role and Act on barriers that exist, preventing your team or other office teams from meeting the stated purposes of our services. You might listen into customer phone calls and note what your team have to do to meet customer demand. Analyse data from IT systems to understand trends in performance. Acting on knowledge you have about the service, you might arrange a trial method of service delivery to ensure the change you feel is necessary works as you expected. Sharing learning with your peer group or local management team. Managing a difficult customer interaction on the counter or on the phone. Assisting the area manager analyse data. Meeting with representatives from our service providers company to jointly work on a service delivery issue Praising an individual(s) for a job well done Arranging for the customer area to be improved by updating notices or arranging cleaning

Less typical in a working day but occasionally required could be

Working with a Human Resources Officer to effect a change in behaviour for a member of your team. Spending time on the estate observing the customer experience first-hand by visiting the customer's home or our service providers premises or work sites. Delivering a presentation to your team Travelling to other areas of the Housing Service to understand alternative approaches or impact their working practice has on service delivery in your office, or the housing service as a whole.

Who is the person?

You need to:

1. Have experience of working in a challenging front line service 2. Have the ability to communicate effectively with anyone (verbally or in writing), from the most socially disadvantage tenant to a senior professional including MPs and local ward councillors. 3. Be able to work independently or as part of a team using your own initiative and judgement to find appropriate and effective solutions to any barriers that prevent efficient customer service delivery. 4. Be able to make a decision which is structured and transparent. 5. Have ability to manage small projects, review current working practices and deliver change. 6. Be willing to take on the challenges of managing a team of individuals to provide a valued and effective customer service experience. 7. Be able to identify what resource or information you may need at any given time and pull this to you to help achieve results for our customers. 8. Have ability to remain calm and professional if facing an aggressive or emotionally demanding customer 9. Be adept at using a variety of IT systems including Microsoft Excel, to analyse data, being proficient in drilling into the data to uncover valuable information. 10. You need to have good numeracy skills to count cash and look for discrepancy in columns of figures. 11. Be flexible as you may be required to work from any of the seven area housing offices.

Closing time/date, 16:00, on the 10th April 2015 Applications received after this may not be considered Assessment & interview process: 27th & 28th April 2015