Paul Morrison and Prof Michael Lewis explore five key tenets for operational leaders in public service: focus on long-term value over short-term metrics, co-design services with users, align and shape capacity and demand, ensure efficient workflow to reduce failure demand, and lead cross-agency collaboration. These principles foster resilient, user-centred services that deliver lasting public value.
Paul Morrison has been the Chief Executive of the Planning Inspectorate since December 2022. A career Civil Servant, he joined the Home Office in 1996 as an Administrative Officer. He has since spent time in a range of operational and policy roles across several Government departments including the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) Food Standards Agency (FSA), Home Office, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) and Northern Ireland Office on areas ranging from support to refugees, Visa processing, counter terrorism and planning reform.
Prof Michael Lewis is a Professor of Operations & Supply at University of Bath School of Management. His work explored a broad wide range of operations and supply management challenges, ranging from fast fashion retail and senior care to the initiation of mega-projects and the retrofitting of buildings. His latest work, "A Better Way to Pilot Emerging Technologies" (with Netland and Maghazei) has just been published in MIT Sloan Management Review. Michael's long-standing engagement with public policy includes helping to evaluate Best Value legislation, support for 'failing' local government services, PFI contracting and, most recently, the regulation of emerging technologies.
Delivering for the public is hard. Most public services operate under very real constraints: contradictory requirements, limited budgets, workforce pressures, shifting political priorities. Yet some operational leaders manage to not only sustain their organisations but strengthen them. What makes the difference? Following a series of energetic conversations, we (just about) managed to agree on five tenets—core principles that define how a modern operational leader can contribute to the creation of real, lasting public value.
1. Remember Not Everything That is Counted Counts
Public services often mistake output for value. Measuring how many applications are processed or how quickly decisions are made is straightforward; assessing whether those decisions are fair, improve lives, and strengthen the system over time is far more difficult. Under pressure to demonstrate performance, operations can become too focused on what is easy to count rather than what truly matters.
The first tenet is that operational leaders must shape performance measurement to reinforce long-term value, not just short-term efficiency. Policy aims for broad public outcomes, but when operations default to cases closed, response times met, and targets hit, the system drifts toward shallow measures of success. A visa system that values speed over scrutiny may look productive but is vulnerable to exploitation. A welfare system that processes claims quickly but drives unnecessary appeals is not solving problems but creating new ones.
Operational leaders set a different standard. They need to challenge performance frameworks that reward superficial efficiency while undermining long-term outcomes. This means resisting the false trade-off between immediate performance and lasting resilience—making sure that what gets measured serves what truly matters, not the other way around.
2. Design Services With, not For Users
A public service that functions in theory but fails in practice is no service at all. Too often, systems reflect bureaucratic logic rather than lived experience—optimiszed for internal processes while making access harder for those who need them.
The second tenet is that operational leaders must actively design services with users, not just for them. This is not about handing over decision-making but about stress-testing assumptions, identifying friction points, and embedding responsiveness into the system. The goal is ensuring services work not just for the ideal user but for the full range of real ones.
Great operational leaders treat service design as a way of working, not a project. This means continually refining based on evidence, adapting to changes, and ensuring that policy aspirations translate into operational reality. Done well, design helps anticipate failure points, reduce complexity without sacrificing capability, and build systems that function at scale.
A service that meets theoretical objectives but frustrates users isn’t succeeding—it’s failing in ways that are harder to see. Leaders must take ownership of how services feel to those who rely on them and design accordingly.
3. Link Capacity and Demand—Then Actively Shape Both
Public services succeed or fail based on how well they align capacity and demand. Neither is fixed—both are shaped by policy, public expectations, and system design. Demand rises in response to crises, demographic shifts, and economic conditions but can also be amplified by inefficiencies, poor forecasting, and perverse incentives. Likewise, capacity is not just a matter of resource availability—it is structured by workforce models, procurement processes, and institutional priorities. When these forces drift apart, the result is either unmet need or wasted resources.
The third tenet is that operational leaders must actively define and shape both capacity and demand. This means going beyond reactive problem-solving to proactively manage service pressures. Leaders who do this well do not just clear backlogs—they intervene before the system overloads. They understand their data, can distinguish between different types of demand, separating structural demand from cyclical surges and failure demand, which is caused by avoidable inefficiencies. They tackle failure demand at its source, reducing unnecessary interactions and repeated processes that drain capacity without adding value. At the same time, they recognize that capacity is not just about increasing resources but about how effectively resources are used—ensuring that workforce models, procurement systems, and service structures allow flexibility in response to changing needs.
Anticipating and shaping demand is not about managing queues—it’s about changing the conditions that create them. Leaders who understand this do not just keep services running; they create the conditions for them to thrive.
4. Make Work Flow—Or Watch Demand Rise
Hidden queues, slow handovers, and bureaucratic friction do more than waste time. They actively reduce public value by delaying outcomes, frustrating users, and consuming capacity that could be used elsewhere. Poor flow creates more demand—repeat interactions, unresolved cases, and avoidable escalations.
The fourth tenet is that operational leaders must take responsibility for how work moves through the system. They do not simply push for faster processing; they actively shape workflows, eliminate inefficiencies, and prevent bottlenecks before they emerge. Managing flow is not about forcing speed but about ensuring that services move efficiently while maintaining quality.
When failure demand rises, leaders do not see it as an inevitability but as a signal that something upstream needs attention. Leaders take responsibility for these points of friction, ensuring that handoffs between teams and agencies are seamless, that cases do not become trapped in administrative limbo, and that unnecessary complexity does not slow service delivery.
5. Collaborate Across Boundaries—Or Be Limited By Them
Public value is never delivered in isolation. Housing, health, education, and policing all depend on multiple actors working together. Yet public services are rarely structured for collaboration—fragmented budgets, misaligned incentives, and siloed accountability make it easier for agencies to work around each other rather than with each other.
The final tenet is that operational leaders must lead collaboration with intent. They do not just advocate for cross-agency cooperation—they actively create the conditions for it to succeed. They do not just break down barriers—they remove the excuses that keep them standing in the first place.
Great operational leaders do not assume collaboration will happen because it is necessary; they make it work by shaping relationships, trust, and incentives. They do not let slow-moving governance structures dictate the pace of change but build practical mechanisms for joint decision-making and real-time coordination. They ensure that working together is not just preferable but unavoidable by making shared goals the default and not the exception.
Conclusions
Operations leadership in the service of public value is not just about what gets done, not just about reacting to crises - it is also about what is prevented from failing, what is kept ready, and what is structured to endure. The enduring challenge is not to eliminate the tensions between these forces—it is to recognize them, define them and ultimately navigate them with clarity, discipline, and intent. That is the work of operational leadership. We hope these tenets offer a starting point for how that work can be done.
All articles posted on this blog give the views of the author(s), and not the position of the IPR, nor of the University of Bath.
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