Lancashire County Council

Our Corporate Strategy

Our Corporate Strategy is the cornerstone of our policy framework. It provides the basis for all we do and for the many other plans and strategies we must produce. It is also used to help shape our budgets.

The strategy covers a four-year period and aims to translate our ambition into a set of strategic objectives. These are based around our vision – ‘Lancashire… A place where everyone matters’ – those things that will make the most difference in reducing poverty, discrimination and inequality and improving the quality of life for local people.

The Corporate Strategy, together with business plans, guides and influences the Annual Delivery Plan produced by cabinet members and our Executive Leadership Team. Each Annual Delivery Plan sets out our priorities for the coming year, as well as:

• tracking progress in major projects and initiatives;
• reporting the performance of our services; and
• setting out our strategy for continued improvement over the next year and beyond.

The core purpose of our Corporate Strategy for 2005–2009 is to make sure we promote:

• community cohesion;
• equality and diversity; and
• social inclusion.

We will do this by making sure Lancashire is a place where everyone can enjoy equal and high quality life chances and be valued and respected in their communities.

This means:

• championing the needs of the community, including providing equal access to services and eliminating discrimination;
• promoting equal life chances and a good quality of life for all residents; and
• promoting good relations between all groups of people.

Although these are separate principles, they are very much interlinked in terms of the range of issues they each cover and the people they affect.

The challenge for us is to make sure our policies on community cohesion, equality and diversity, and social inclusion are integrated into mainstream activity. We will embed these policies in all aspects of our work, including service-planning, policy development, performance management, staff appraisal and procurement.

We will also strengthen our capacity to achieve our objectives by:

• empowering our staff through development and training;
• raising awareness and understanding through planned communication;
• developing internal and external consultation arrangements;
• making sure our data collection and retention systems help us in decision-making; and
• working in partnership.

Our structure

Our services are provided by the Office of the Chief Executive, four directorates and a direct service organisation (DSO).

• The Office of the Chief Executive
• Lancashire County Commercial Group
• The Resources Directorate
• The Environment Directorate
• The Adult and Community Services Directorate
• The Directorate for Children and Young People

Click here to read more about the directorates (27kb)