He is a business expert who wrote a book on the lessons to learn from the Titanic disaster over 100 years ago.
And now Kevin McPhillips, who is also a hypnotherapist, has a new project: helping turn around the struggling vessel that is Police Scotland.
The single force is struggling to cope with budget problems, a disgruntled workforce and the fallout from scandals on call centre bungles and illegal spying.
Holyrood heard last week how Police Scotland, which was set up in the hope of making large-scale efficiencies, is forecasting a deficit of £27.5m. New personnel have been brought in recently, some of whom have a background in the financial services sector.
In August, the Scottish Police Authority announced that David Page had been appointed as the Deputy Chief Officer on a salary of up to £175,000. His task is to deliver “transformational change”.
Louise Haggerty has also been brought in as the interim director of people and development on a short-term contract.
Page and Haggerty have both held senior positions at the Royal Bank of Scotland, the UK institution that required a multi-billion pound bailout from the taxpayer after nearly going bust.
It has now emerged that McPhillips, who also worked for RBS in a consultancy capacity, has been drafted in on a short-term basis to help the force.
According to his social media profile, McPhillips has over twenty years experience in change and programme management, including at the Metropolitan police, the banking sector and central and local government. He is also a hypnotherapist.
He is currently listed as a “change programme manager” for “law enforcement” in Scotland. However, it is the subject he wrote about as an author which may help him understand the difficulties at the troubled force.
In 2012, he penned Titanic: Enterprise and Risk, a dissection of the decisions that led to the most famous passenger-liner in history sinking after colliding with an iceberg in 1912.
“Should people, especially at a senior operational level, be empowered or even encouraged to raise concerns over operational decisions?” he wrote. “Take account of the icebergs, and adjust accordingly.”
On the disaster itself, he stated that there was “no intentional erosion of safety”, but claimed there was “arrogance and carelessness”.
In a section that could also apply to problems at Police Scotland, he concluded: “Any business enterprise should be driven by vision, and that vision supported by strategy, high standards, and efficient operations.
“Obstacles will arise, but the key is to know how to identify them in advance, and deal with them properly if they materialise”.
Gerry Crawley, a regional organiser with the trade union Unison, said: “As the Scottish Police Authority and Police Scotland continue to cut Unison members’ jobs and offer below inflation pay rises they are sailing close to the wind by employing contractors at high cost to the public purse. The current financial crisis is only the tip of the iceberg as there are forecasts of much worse to come in ?the next financial year and UNISON fears that contractors rather than full time support staff will be increasingly used at greater expense”.
Liberal Democrat MSP Liam McArthur said: “Police Scotland has been sinking ever deeper beneath the financial waves. On a weekly basis we hear how officers are struggling to keep their head above the water and do the job the public expect of them. In these circumstances, who better to advise Police Scotland than someone who knows how the Titanic could have been saved”.
Scottish Conservative shadow justice secretary Douglas Ross said:
“This author may have written about rearranging deckchairs on the Titanic, but perhaps he could show Police Scotland how to rearrange some officers out from behind desks and into communities.
“The single force’s reputation is in danger of dipping below the waterline, so perhaps Mr McPhillips could use some of his unsinkable expertise to bring it back to shore safely.”
A Police Scotland spokesperson said: “Kevin McPhillips has just started work as a project manager at Police Scotland and is on a short-term contract following the appropriate interview process. Mr McPhillips is a very experienced senior project and programme manager, in both the private and public sector, who was most recently the lead business change manager with the Metropolitan Police Service on the Met Integrated Police System, part of the One Met Model Transformation Programme.”
McPhillips declined to comment.
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