I’ve been at Companies House since June 2020, leading the Strategic Finance Team which was created when Companies House became centrally funded by government.
Our work involves:
- investment appraisal
- financial planning and reporting
- running the funding model
But our primary focus is to drive the agenda of public value and efficiency at Companies House. This is not something that can be done by one team though, so we work with colleagues across the organisation, as well as in other government bodies, to provide best public value and make our processes more efficient.
Measuring the value of our outputs
In the private sector, the output of services can be valued using prices.
The free-at-the-point-of-use nature of a number of our services prevents a similar method for valuing outputs at Companies House. For example, our work on combatting economic crime is a multi-agency effort and it’s difficult to identify how much of the outputs we achieve are directly due to the work of Companies House colleagues.
At Companies House, we do everything within our power to measure the outputs of our work, but we also follow the principles set out in the Public Value Framework. This means the way we work maximises the likelihood of providing the best value from the funding we receive.
Part of this approach is to look at our services on a whole, so that we do not get stuck in the pattern of cutting costs to the detriment of our customers. Similarly, we simply will not invest our resources in projects that would deliver low value outcomes.
We’re always seeking ways to make our processes more efficient, making every pound we spend work towards achieving our strategic goals. This way of thinking is set in our organisational culture. For example, when we build digital solutions, we rank all the things we’re doing by value, highest first, then we work our way down the list. We know that whenever we draw a line and move onto the next thing, we’ve always achieved the most value we could with the resources available.
Standing by our corporate values
By letting our teams be adaptable, bold and curious, we allow them to find transformational solutions to the problems we face. This improves efficiency for us and for our customers. After all, with over 4 million companies on the register, if we can make a modest time saving for our customers every time they transact with us, there’s a lot of resource being freed up for UK companies.
Companies House is transforming. We’re already one year into our 5-year transformation programme and the amount of change so far has been huge. We’ve seen some fundamental changes to our services, with creative solutions to longstanding pain points that have provided the desired outputs within budget. Now that’s good value!
I’m really looking forward to seeing how more efficiencies will be carried out through the high value projects in the transformation programme over the next few years, particularly, the changes that register reform will bring.
I’m very proud to be working with such a dynamic team, both in Strategic Finance and across Companies House. It’s an exciting time to be working here.
Our 5-year strategy details a new vision for Companies House and outlines our commitment to driving confidence in the UK economy.
Read more about how we’re helping to make the UK the best place to start and run a business.
