HQN’s new regulation toolkit is designed to help you get ready for the upcoming round of inspections in housing. The work landlords do is under intense scrutiny from social media, the papers, TV and politicians. So, these inspections won’t be an easy ride. Nor should they be. We need to stamp out completely the dreadful cases that have tarnished our reputations.
And there are no shortcuts on the road to recovery. Any attempt at gaming the results will be as futile as it is contemptible. The Regulator of Social Housing (RSH) says it will take a dim view of any landlord that sugar coats their Tenant Satisfaction Measures (TSMs). Meanwhile, the Housing Ombudsman is sharply critical of landlords that only get into gear when he and his team start asking a few questions.
The only way to provide good services across the piece is if all your staff are on side. We need skilled and motivated people who go hunting for problems. Leaders must listen and act on what plumbers, electricians, call centre workers, housing managers and others are telling them. Yes, there have been great advances in the way we use data. But we are a long way off automating housing management. It will always rely on humans. You need well-informed and motivated staff to prove to inspectors that your services are strong day in and day out.
Our toolkit is based on pilot inspections HQN has been running. You can read more about those on page 16. Some of the pilots have been with landlords that do indeed face sharp criticism. What’s striking is how quickly you can diagnose problems. That’s because the leaders and staff we work with are under no illusions about where the issues lie. And they’re honest and open, so they tell us all about it. We go to great lengths to talk to tenants, and it’s not surprising that tenants and frontline staff make very similar points. Improvements will not come about instantly. As the saying goes, Rome was not built in a day.
“Developing improvement plans that tenants and staff can have confidence in will not be easy, as patience is in short supply. But you can spot an improvement plan that’s fanciful a mile off: it won’t deliver for tenants and it will not placate inspectors either”
The art of management will be in developing improvement plans that tenants and staff can have confidence in. That will not be easy, as patience is in short supply. But you can spot an improvement plan that’s fanciful a mile off: it won’t deliver for tenants and it won’t placate inspectors either.
Our general advice is to track all your TSMs and compare these with peers as quickly as you can. That will maximise the time you have available to understand and correct any adverse trends. HQN is far from alone in being concerned about diversity. We expect that the satisfaction figures for black and brown tenants will be low. It’s time to get to the bottom of this and do better. Michael Gove was unimpressed with the warm words from Rochdale Boroughwide Homes versus the reality of the poor services doled out to black and brown tenants. Very often, black and brown staff satisfaction isn’t great either. Work to do.
We’ll only get our reputation back when all our staff and leaders are pulling in the same direction for tenants. Let’s hope that government helps by finding a way to assist landlords to improve. We have an endless supply of sticks today, but no carrots at all.
We hope you find the toolkit useful and please let us know if we can help you out with more hands-on support.
Alistair McIntosh, Chief Executive, HQN
