3.32 Following the signing of a deal, there may well be staff changes in both the contract management function and the contractor. This may be a natural progression, since the skills required on the contract management side for negotiating a deal differ from those required to manage a deal and a department's negotiating staff may be asked to use their skills to procure another PFI deal for the department. The Managing the Relationship report noted that a number of departments and contractors said that they had experienced difficulties because of a lack of staff continuity within contract management teams.
3.33 The Departments have told us that, in order to manage this situation, they put in place succession planning arrangements. However, a number of key staff members moved on after the deal was signed. These included the Project Board Director and Deputy Director. Three of the four most senior procurement staff moved on very soon after contract signature, leaving only one key member of the original STEPS team still involved in the deal. There were also a number of management changes at Mapeley STEPS shortly after the contract was signed. The finance director was not appointed until nearly a year into the contract, in January 2002, and there were four services directors within seven months of the contract going live. The current Deputy Chairman (former CEO) of Mapeley STEPS has been involved in the deal from the start and continues to be so, thus providing some continuity. But overall, the loss of key senior staff in all parties means that the Departments and the contractor potentially lost valuable knowledge of the purpose of the contract. While the contract can be read by those new to the deal, such subsequent interpretation may not fully capture the intention of those who originally wrote it.