1.2 The Strengthening Management and Governance Programme

The Strengthening Management and Governance programme aims to develop strong and effective institutional governance and management capacity in established Māori organisations and businesses contracted to deliver government services.¹ The programme was developed by Te Puni Kōkiri at a time when public and political scrutiny was heavily focused on Māori organisations delivering, or failing to deliver, government-funded health, welfare, education and justice programmes. Te Puni Kōkiri regards the SMG programme as a means of increasing the capacity of established Māori organisations by assisting them to:

• establish high value, sustainable relationships with government funders; and
• avert the risk of high profile failures that in the past have highlighted weak governance leading to poor accountability and decision making.²

The SMG programme aims to achieve four key high level outcomes:

• Outcome 1: Māori organisations involved in the delivery of government service contracts achieve high quality outcomes and are accountable to stakeholders.
• Outcome 2: Government funding is targeted appropriately.
• Outcome 3: To contribute to the growth of strong Māori organisations able to meet organisations’ goals and take advantage of future opportunities.
• Outcome 4: To increase stakeholder confidence in the accountability of Māori organisations.

To achieve these outcomes, the SMG programme assists Māori organisations by providing an independent organisational analysis and, where required, assists them with tailored interventions to enhance or improve their performance.

Phase 1: Organisational analysis

The key component of the SMG programme is the provision of an independent report to Māori organisations on their operating performance in key governance and management areas. Te Puni Kōkiri contracts external consultants (assessors) to undertake independent assessments of organisations. Six assessor organisations have been engaged as preferred providers to the SMG programme.

Te Puni Kōkiri selects and assigns assessors to work with organisations based on a preliminary (informal) match of the assessors’ skills and the requirements of organisations.

The assessments are based on a standardised, yet flexible, framework that assessors follow to identify strengths and specific gaps in the organisations’ governance and management practices. From this analysis, the assessors recommend areas for improvement and practical solutions. The assessments are voluntary – organisations decide if they wish to participate – and full assessment reports are confidential to the organisation. Te Puni Kōkiri receives only a summary copy of the key findings due to the confidential and commercially sensitive nature of the report contents.

Phase 2: Tailored remedial activities

The second component of the SMG programme is the provision of remedial support to organisations that completed the initial assessment process. The purpose of the remedial support is to address the areas for improvement identified in the assessors’ reports. This phase is achieved through limited funding support from Te Puni Kōkiri or the facilitation and brokering of assistance from other government funders. In this phase, organisations are able to choose who undertakes the remedial work. The majority of organisations choose to have the remedial work but some choose not to. Some advised that they will undertake remedial work as their timeframes and resources allow.

Programme criteria

Although the programme is voluntary in nature, Māori organisations are required to meet certain criteria to be eligible for the SMG programme. Organisations are required to be in either the ‘development’ or ‘established’ stage of the business lifecycle; have significant responsibilities for service delivery and/or asset management; and have a minimum annual income of $300,000 in government service contracts.

When the programme was first introduced, the qualifying threshold was an income of $800,000 per annum. The lowering of the threshold has allowed more organisations to enter the programme. Proactive targeting by Te Puni Kōkiri of organisations with development needs (such as Māori radio stations) has enabled a wider catchment of Māori organisations to participate in the programme.

Investment quantum

Since the inception of the SMG programme, Te Puni Kōkiri has invested in excess of $4 million in the programme.

On average, each assessment costs approximately $20,000 (including disbursements of up to a maximum of $5,000).

Programme milestones

The table below provides an overview of the key project milestones for the SMG programme.

Table 1: Chronological milestones for the SMG programme

Table 1: Chronological milestones for the SMG programme

Milestones	Implementation
SMG programme established	Mid-2003
Pilot phase – assessment of 26 organisations completed	January-May 2004
Trial review – internal paper completed	July 2004
Independent evaluation of the programme (process evaluation) completed	June 2005
Over 110 organisational assessments completed	December 2007
Outcomes evaluation commenced	March 2008

Overview of findings of SMG evaluation report June 2005

The June 2005 evaluation report³ found that the SMG programme was widely supported by organisations and assessors. The report identified critical factors leading to the success of the SMG programme. These included: the programme’s non-compulsory nature; the quality of the assessors and their reports, and the respect assessors showed towards the tikanga, kawa and kaupapa of organisations. The report also noted the willingness of Te Puni Kōkiri to adapt the programme where necessary.

The report noted that it was too early to make any definitive statements about the achievement of the programme outcomes and that these outcomes would only be visible after a longer period of time. However, some outcomes were evident and these included:

• improving management and governance in Māori organisations – the SMG programme helped organisations to work out priorities for action and provided strategies and resources to address the issues; and
• improving confidence in the business capacity of Māori organisations – organisations reported increased confidence within themselves and with a range of stakeholders including other government agencies.

The report also identified areas for improvement. Some of these included:

• leveraging the policy and operational feedback loop within Te Puni Kōkiri – an opportunity for Te Puni Kōkiri to maximise the lessons from the SMG programme;
• developing the facilitation and brokerage role of Te Puni Kōkiri – more preparatory work at a national and regional level was still required to move Te Puni Kōkiri from solely a funding role to a mixture of funding and brokering;
• reconsidering the role of assessors in the remediation work with organisations; and
• ensuring the follow-up remedial process was timely.

Overall, the evaluation found that the assessment phase was popular, the assessor reports were valid and accurate, and the remediation phase needed to be improved.

 

¹ CAB Min (03) 30/6 refers.
² Paper to Cabinet Social Development Committee, 24 July 2003, p1.
³ Te Puni Kōkiri (2005).