TheFinancial Planning Association(FPA) will suffer “a probable net loss of fifteen” staff through retrenchment following yesterday’s announcement of restructure plans that will flatten its organisational structure and result in eight instead of five business units reporting directly to new chief executive, Kerrie Kelly.
However dismissed staff who contactedMoney Managementclaim the departures will reach 22 staffers after they were given the option of leaving yesterday or waiting until December 24 to accept retrenchment.
Although Kelly, who spoke to a number of the association’s Melbourne-based staff yesterday afternoon and alerted them to the changes, says the number of departures at this stage is unclear as many have been given the option of transferring to another division and/or state and are in the process of deciding whether to accept.
“I can’t give you a definite number as there are people who have gone home to sleep on it, as to whether they want to move into a different area or take redundancy,” Kelly said yesterday.
As for the three additional business units, they are business analysis, professional practice, and public policy and government relations – the first two of which are newly created divisions, while the public policy and government relations unit is being spun out as a stand alone area.
The shake-up, effective as of January 5, is a bid by the association to enhance its service to members by streamlining its operations and consolidating areas previously split between Melbourne and Sydney, Kelly says.
“It’s really about bringing the functional areas together and getting them to operate effectively, some functions were being performed in more than one area and they are being brought together,” she says.
According to Kelly, the FPA had a number of inherent structural problems that she was made aware of from day one of taking over at the helm of the association – problems reflected in the barrage of criticism the FPA has faced from its own members in recent times.
“It was clear as soon as I joined the FPA that there were structural problems in its existing organisational approach, made even more difficult because some functions were split between Sydney and Melbourne.
“The FPA Board made it clear to me that members expected better services than they were currently receiving, and put member satisfaction as the priority for the FPA executive… Our major theme for 2004 will [therefore] be delivering relevant member services cost effectively,” Kelly says.
The eight business units reporting to Kelly are split into key operations which deliver services to and on behalf of members and the support services to these key functions.
The four key operations are Member Services; Professional Practice; Public Policy and Government Relations; and Education Policy, while the four support areas are Public Relations and Communications; Business Analysis; Corporate Services; and Human Resources.
Kelly says the Public Relations and Communications division will be relocating from Melbourne to Sydney.
