The Tenant Services Authority starts the fight back

This week's Inside Housing cover story is about the housing sector rallying to support the Tenant Services Authority (TSA) in light of criticism by Grant Shapps, the Shadow Housing Minister. 

The campaign, dubbed Operation Pink owing to the TSA's love of fuchsia, originates from the Chartered Institute of Housing and the G15 group of the largest housing associations in London among others.
In the past year Grant Shapps has said publicly of the TSA:

• ‘I am not terribly impressed that the authority has so far spent its time surveying 27,000 tenants to get responses and then writing a draft report about what it might do. I want to see action from those organisations - they are spending a lot of public money.’
• ‘I know housing associations care passionately for tenants… I am not sure setting up an administrative bureaucracy to care for tenants is the best possible solution so I am slightly sceptical but no decisions have been made.’
• 'The TSA has made incredibly slow progress, if the truth be known.'

From a communications perspective, Grant Shapps' frustration with the TSA provides an interesting challenge. Every time I read one of these quotes I flinched, putting myself in the position of the TSA's comms team. How would I respond if I was managing public relations for an organisation that had been roundly scorned by the very person that in six months time could hold its fate in his hands?

My tactic would be to come out fighting. I'd put up a strategic communications calendar up on the wall of the office and I'd mark every day leading up to the election, indeed every minute of every day, for proving the organisation's worth. I'd use every communications tool in the book to show pound for pound value for money and efficiency. From speeches to web presence, media relations and events, I'd lobby the Conservatives hard, emphasising the TSA's adaptability to change, capability to drive service improvements and complete commitment to put tenants first and I'd ensure not one penny was wasted in the process. I'd call on supportive organisations with clout to back us up and I'd make as much noise as possible while doing it. I wondered why the TSA didn't appear to be doing any of these things.

Then on Wednesday, the TSA's annual report dropped into my inbox. Judging by that publication, Operation Pink and the five press releases issued in the last two weeks, the fight back has started. The Conservatives may not win next year's general election but whatever the result, the TSA can only improve its position by standing up for itself. I will watch its progress with interest.

How to report performance to tenants

It might sound geeky, but in my role, one of my favourite tasks is reporting performance to tenants. This is not because I'm mad about numbers or statistics, but because it brings together the three strands that I think should drive social housing: resident involvement, continuous improvement and communications.

What to report?

The Housing Corporation used to issue a code of performance that needed to be reported to tenants, but since the advent of the Tenant Services Authority, no specific guidance has been in place. Instead the regulators look for clear and honest performance reporting but delegate freedom on the specific elements to the social landlord. At Orbit East, we've made a commitment to tenants that we would report on our service standards. These standards are our promise to tenants of how we will serve them.

How?

It's important that performance information can be clearly understood. Tenants haven't got time to spend poring over figures and graphs. Traffic lights, smiley faces, colours and arrows are all simple ways to communicate performance. Sometimes a pie chart can communicate the information visually much easier than text.

Wherever possible it is also useful to include a benchmark - the standard that the best landlords are meeting - and the previous year or quarter's performance, so the tenant can see the trend.

I use the tenants' newsletter to report performance annually, but depending on your organisation's needs and your customer base, you could use your website, a dedicated publication or a letter quarterly or even monthly. I think it's also crucial to include commentary, to explain the results and most importantly, how the organisation will improve its performance moving forward.

Here's the most recent performance document I produced. I'd welcome anyone's (particularly from tenants) comments on how it could be improved.

Thanks to John Marchan for the use of his traffic lights image.

Are you a secret social media linker?

Recently, I've become aware that my social media habits are not regarded as normal. When I've enthused about something I've seen on Twitter to my family who aren't into social media, I've been met with raised eyebrows and smirks.

When my friends asked me what I was doing on a certain evening and I said I was going to an event about mashing up data, they wrinkled their brows and looked bemused. They knew better than to query me further and wrote it off as one of my little oddities.

When I told work colleagues that I was volunteering at Solihull Social Media Surgery, silence fell. I explained that I was one of a group of people who are helping councillors learn how to blog. One asked me 'are you paid?'. When I replied that I wasn't, he said 'but, why would you do that?' I started to say it was fun to help people learn about the power of social media but then I realised I sounded rather strange and I buttoned my lip.

It hasn't quite got to the stage where I sneak around in my pyjamas, looking for my next fix, but until my friends and family get hooked on social media too, I'm going to have to keep quiet about being a secret social media linker.