PS I ♥️ You Unplugged: Leadership, Careers, and Communities – A Conversation with Joanna Killian

In this first episode of Public Sector I HEART You ‘Unplugged’, Rebecca Davis sits down with Joanna Killian, Chief Executive of the Local Government Association, to explore her inspiring journey from housing officer to leading the LGA.

Transcript

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Hello and welcome to the Public Sector I Heart You podcast. Today I'm joined by Joanna Killian from the Local Government Association. I'm Rebecca Davis, Chief Executive at West Midlands Employers. And we're going to be talking a little bit about local government, a little bit about careers, and a little bit about Joanna's leadership journey. So let's get started. Firstly, thank you for joining us today, Joanna. Now, I know you are a chief executive at the Local Government Association, but some of those listening might not be familiar with the LGA and the role that you play in the sector. So just tell us a little bit about the Local Government Association. Yeah. As you say, my name is Joanna Killian. I'm Chief Executive at the Local Government Association, and I've been in that role since March 2024. And it's flown by. The Local Government Association exists to promote local government. We are there to make sure that the interests of a hugely different family of organisations are heard in government. We exist to support local government, to make beautiful councils even more wonderful, to engage with them when they need improvement as well. Brilliant. I know I've worked in local government for 20 years and the LGA has always been such a central part of the sector. Just tell me a little bit about what your experience has been like joining, because it's quite exciting time to be in the sector, I think. Yeah. So I'm an absolute fan of local government. I know that every day colleagues across local government, fantastic politicians, you know, are changing the lives of individuals, from the most vulnerable children and adults, right through to securing economic growth that will make sure that people are in jobs and roles that are enhancing their quality of life. So I'm an absolute passionate advocate of local government. And for me, joining as chief exec of the Local Government Association, it's like the pinnacle of my career. It is about being the figurehead of the organisation, being able to demonstrate consistently across Whitehall funders that local government is the most incredible partner. It can deliver the missions of this government, but can do it with high levels of integrity and with democracy at the heart of it. So the Local Government Association at the moment is just a great place to work. We do have a new government and we've been frenetically busy, actually, in and out, talking to ministers, officials about a new partnership between central and local government. Of course, arguing for all the resources and capabilities that we need to make our sector hum even more loudly. So it's a really, really great time to be there. There definitely feels there’s a a momentum and a different tone and a different level of engagement and excitement, I think across the sector about what could be possible. Absolutely, yeah. Focusing a little bit on local government, it often gets a bit of bad press I think, doesn’t it? We hear about the bad stories in the news, but some of those great stories I think often go unheard. So if you were telling someone about why local government was such a great place to work, who might be thinking about coming into our sector or transferring out of another part of the public sector. What would be your elevator pitch to them about why they should come and join local government? I think if you are really interested in working in a sort of dynamic, productive, energising sector where you absolutely can be guaranteed that you could change the life of a young person who might have had a really tough time through school, who could be transformed into a perfect person and in a great role. Then local government is the place to be. If you are passionate about the environment, local government is at the forefront, actually, of making change happen in places, to manage the consequence of climate change, support adaptation and to invest in new technologies. If you are really, really interested in making sure that people are safe and well and can thrive at home, you'd love a career working with us, supporting vulnerable older people. If you were a lawyer wanting to make a huge change, we do some of the most interesting work in the country. Interesting and complicated. And really complex, but inspiring, motivational, complex. And it's a place where you can start in one role and sort of thread your way through and know that you can make a difference and, you know, genuinely have a really fulfilling career. Absolutely, it’s what attracted me all those years ago. I think one thing which is changing all the time is that some people just don't seem to stay a career for their whole life of their world of work, do they? They move around. We're doing a lot of work to talk about “squiggly careers”, where people jumble around different sectors and I think that add huge value. So, it's probably a good segue in to tell us a little bit about your leadership journey and where your career started and some of the highlights for you. So, I had a bit of a squiggly career, but actually, you might look at my CV and think God, it's really sort of boringly conventional, but it wasn't, you know, in a way, it was, a sequence of decisions that led me into this fantastic role. But, I was the first person in my family to go to university. I left university, didn't know what to do, but I ended up in investment banking and absolutely hated it. And then so after a period of travel, a temporary job working for a council in housing and homelessness, and my friends in the city thought I had absolutely lost my mind doing this. But I found myself in a great team, working with communities and felt truly inspired. It sort of spoke to me and my upbringing. It was a complex upbringing. So I just found myself, you know, in love and feeling that I could sort of make a difference. So I moved from housing to regeneration to do community development, big estate renewals. I then moved from doing that work in East London into South London, where I was working in a council, sort of more, on strategy, policy, doing back office work as well. I then became a regulator, so I helped set up the Housing Inspectorate a very long time ago. And again, that, you know, people are a bit curious about why I would move from a sector I love to a sector that was regulating us. But again, that enabled me to work around the country actually to make a difference. Actually, some of the stuff that we saw was not brilliant. But it just gave an insight into working in government as well. So having been a regulator, including supporting performance, improvement in councils, I went to be finance director at Essex County Council. I'm not a finance person, but it happened to be a role where you didn't need to be qualified, so I sort of jumped to that. I mean, these are the squiggles in your career actually. And from there I became chief executive at Essex County Council for the first time, but always trying to hone my sort of personal development around the edge of that. My passion is housing. Counties don't do housing. So I became a board member of big registered social landlord, so I could sort of keep in touch with that. And after a long time in Essex, I went and became a consulting partner with KPMG, which again, you know, fascinating in terms of skills development. It’s quite a step outside of the sector, isn’t it? But really interesting place to work, a place I think incredibly progressive in terms of diversity, inclusion, social mobility. But, you know, I traveled around the world and I learned a lot about the public sector. But then stepped back into our local government sector when I went to be chief executive at Surrey Council. I supported them to sort of really change their financial base, deliver service improvements. And absolutely loved my time, but then attracted into the LGA a few months ago. So that's my whirlwind, sort of semi accidental, sort of squiggly career. Fabulous, thank you for sharing that. I think it's showing that there isn't always a linear path in local government is there? It is about a whole range of different disciplines, professions. And people accumulate skills and different experiences which is our job to help create, you know, people and leaders which represent that that diversity. Absolutely, yeah. It was very interesting that you talked about your time out of the public sector and and sort of coming back in, and I know, certainly when working at a regional level, one of the challenges I often find is that line of sight to the front line and I miss that. And I think a lot of colleagues say, as they progress, they really kind of miss that hands on experience of being to be able to see the difference and feel it. How do you keep your handle on that? Because I heard you speak recently at Harrogate where you were talking about that and I just thought that was that was fascinating. Yeah. I mean, it is one of the dilemmas, I think as you sort of imagine your career and take the sort of career steps. For me personally, my sort of connection and empathy with people who have received the services I'm accountable for, particularly as the chief exec, but also when I was chair at St Mungo's, a homeless charity. I think you can't perform well. You can't make really tough decisions. You can't provide sort of strong, real leadership to your teams unless I think you always have an eye to what is happening. And that means, you know, spending time with teams. It's listening to the feedback of customers. It's working with politicians in their places because they will always have a view about what they see and what they would like to be different. So I think you have to do all of these things together to be sort of consistent and effective. And when I was doing consulting, I mean, I definitely saw some of that, and it was really fascinating to work in Europe and in the States to have a different view about service and delivery. But I'm definitely at my best when I can see frontline impacts. And that's one of the things that I'm sort of adjusting to still at the LGA. Yeah. It's finding that room, isn’t it? And what gives you that sort of feel good about what you’re doing. Because it is a big sector with a lot of challenges. Yeah. And sometimes it's not actually to feel good. It's just to see actually in some of our communities levels of deprivation and poverty are so intense. You know, the withdrawal of public funding in some circumstances over the last few years has meant, you know, some of our communities, our businesses have struggled. So you see the good. But it also for me, when you see, you know, the lives that people are living, for me, the experience of, say, of rough sleepers, you really think, God, you know, my role is to sort of make a difference, to work with politicians to bring about change. Absolutely. And working with politicians, that’s a huge part of the LGA. It’s a member led organisation, isn’t it? And supporting politicians across the country. And as much as it's, you know, we want to get people into careers in local government, I think actually getting people into politics, it’s not something a lot of people think they want to go into, especially with the media portrayal, the risk, the potential harm to politicians. It puts a lot of people off, especially young people who actually we need to get into politics. So how is the LGA supporting who might think, you know what, this career might not be my choice, I might want to be a doctor or a nurse as my profession. But actually I'm really interested in local government. They can do both and it’s trying to marry that up, isn’t it? Yeah. I mean, so part of the role of the LGA is absolutely about encouraging more people into public service, you know, political life. I have the most huge admiration for people that step forward to be councillors or elected mayors. They're really difficult jobs, in the public eye. And I think it's more complex now, the levels of misinformation, disinformation, the way that I think people sort of misunderstand actually the the value of politics. Local politicians are making really positive and difficult choices every day, and they do it sort of properly and ethically and willingly, and their volunteers as well. That's what people don't often think about. They really understand their community, and that is something which is listened to, isn’t it, and that’s the challenge for officers is to translate that. But they're both volunteers, but some of the most professionally brilliant, capable people that I've ever worked for. You know, it's a passion and devotion. It's volunteering, but it is a full time big role. So we are always encouraging people, not only to think about the power of being a really good, effective, present ward councilor. But actually the huge, huge difference you can make locally, regionally, nationally if you're leading a council or as a mayor, the accountabilities that you have say as a cabinet member for children's, keeping children safe, I mean, the statutory responsibilities that you have to pursue. So I have huge admiration, but we need to do more, actually, to protect our politicians, to make it safe and viable for them to participate. This new government is, I think, exploring new ways to encourage more participation, like remote participation when needed. But, yeah, we have to keep our democracy thriving. Absolutely. So just sort of focusing on a bit about people coming in at the start of their career and talking to some of those people at the early point where they’re thinking, what do they want to do when they leave school, University. Is there anything you wish someone had told you were that age about what choices should you make? How should you make those choices? Unfortunately, I sort of emerged from school at a points where, you know, if you were a girl, you know, it was like, would you be interested to be a sort of bank teller or a nurse? The typing pool was the highlight! It took me a while to recognise that that just wasn't necessary and that actually I could go to university, and I was encouraged by a great couple of teachers to think that that was possible. I think now, I think it's the decision make is tough for teenagers, isn't it? I mean, some might view still, an automatic route into university is the right thing, and for many young people it is. But I really believe in the power of thinking about modern apprenticeships. There's so many organisations, including councils, I think, that have different pathways. You know, my advice, including to young people around me, is just like, God, you're going to work for a long time. You know, you don't have to sort of make, decisions that stick forever. Sometimes I think you have to sort of follow your heart and passion. What are you good at? What do you like doing? And how does that translate into a degree you might take or the GCSEs that you might use, but just not to pin yourself down so quickly. Absolutely. And you touched another point there which is social mobility, which I think this sector does really well. Yeah, it does. And I think that is something which often we take for granted. We think barriers have been broken down, but there are still a lot of barriers out there aren’t there? So tell me a little bit about how you think we could support more social mobility. Yeah. I think there's lots of routes into local government. You know, we've got some many good grad schemes, councils with us run early entry programmes. And I think it's about how we make sure that we target the right places, geography, schools, to be able to encourage young people into that. I think there's always more that we could do, couldn't we, to get into schools, to talk to young people earlier on about what public service is and the great things that it can do. But it's also how do we get voices in to parents and carers and others to know that actually a career in local government and public service is a really good thing. And it's interesting, actually, one of the great things I learned from being at KPMG was the real focus they had on social mobility. Very active work with schools to identify support and nurture people. I mean, I think they set really positive targets to sort of draw in people from deprived communities, children who wouldn't ordinarily go into university. So I think you have to be really firm, precise. I think you have to do all the boring things about setting targets, investing in it, because I think the outcome for those people, but for organisations is brilliant. The thing that I've had consistently from young people, you know, whatever their entry route has been in, whether it's a local government or in the health service, we've got to make it easier for young people to be in work and be heard. All too often I hear through Young Career Network, colleagues that I engage with, you know, they sometimes feel not listened to and unheard. And sometimes, as you know, supervisors or leaders in the organisation who are a bit older, I think we should be more respectful to the skills and capabilities and way of thinking that young people bring incredible skills. They’ve got incredible skills and insight And I think, like you said, we've got to bend a little bit as employers, haven’t we, and just sort of recognise what that asset is that they bring. And higher skill levels, I mean I've sat with some of my colleagues in Surrey and more recently my organisation, they know more. Some of the people that I work with, they think differently. They've got higher skill levels than I have and it's just like, we've got to be able to use those and find ways of rewarding them and enabling those to underpin career progression, I think. Yeah, absolutely. I feel like we’re on a cusp of real change in that workforce as well. So thank you so much, Joanna for joining us today. I really appreciate it and it’s been lovely to share some of your insights with our listeners. So thank you again. Thank you very much.