City of Perth expands performance review committee amid claims of ‘personality vs performance’

Two council members have been added to a committee reviewing the performance of the City of Perth CEO, but a staff member has been excluded amid claims it is focused on personalities instead of performance. Councillors Raj Doshi and Catherine Lezer have now joined the committee but in a 6-2 vote at its March 31 meeting the council rejected a proposal to add the city’s chief people officer. The committee previously comprised Lord Mayor Bruce Reynolds, deputy Lord Mayor David Goncalves, councillor Liam Gobbert and newly-elected councillors Lisa Ma and Chris Patton. The proposal from Cr Doshi came after the committee’s February 9 meeting, when senior staff, including the executive director governance and strategy, and the chief people officer, were asked to ‘retire’ the meeting just four minutes after it started and before confidential discussions about CEO Michelle Reynold’s performance began. The West Australian understands the chief people officer at the time of the meeting, Claire Allman, has now left the city. Cr Doshi said the WA Local Government Association had told her there was no reason the head of HR could not also be a member of the performance review committee. But both Crs Gobbert and Goncalves said they had been told it was not a good idea. A report presented to the council said that under the Local Government Act, employees could be added to committees and the chief people officer could intervene “where proceedings became harmful”. A psychosocial risk assessment report released in February recommended witnesses or support persons be available between staff and elected members, and that in-person meetings with elected members should have at least two staff members present. Cr Lezer said the performance review needed to be focused “on performance, not personalities”. “Performance reviews are normally a constructive process focused on growth and professional delivery. I sat in on the most recent CEO performance review meeting, and I note the CEO has hit 94 per cent of KPIs,” she said. “A larger committee ensures transparency and provides more professional distance required for fair feedback. It prevents the process from being co-opted.” But other council members believed appointing the chief people officer would lead to a conflict of interest and was not allowed. Cr Goncalves tabled correspondence from WALGA that said appointing an employee to a CEO review committee would be “unusual and may pose some challenges”. “This is a direct contradiction to Cr Doshi’s assertion. This is as far as you can get from an endorsement as you can get,” Cr Goncalves said. “Why are we changing the composition of a committee halfway through? Because mid-change processes don’t strengthen a review. They invite questions. They create ambiguity where there should be clarity and they hand anyone who disputes the outcome a ready-made argument about process integrity. “There may even be questions whether this not notice of motion in in the first place may verge on being unlawful. But I’m going to go further and argue that it is unwise.” Cr Gobbert said it was a “red flag”, citing issues from a similar situation when he was at the City of Joondalup. “Staff found it challenging to be potentially at odds with their employer, and in my view as an overstep of the executive into the legislative function of local government,” he said. Mr Reynolds said adding someone who reported to the CEO did not “make any sense at all”. The review process was also questioned by the public at the start of the meeting. Stuart Chapman of West Perth asked if the CEO’s performance was being assessed in a “genuinely independent and impartial manner” as she had authorised the report on Cr Doshi’s proposal that was presented to the council. Acting executive director governance and strategy Charlie Clark said the city was following model standards for CEO performance. “The local government and the CEO must agree on the process by which the CEO’s performance will be reviewed and any performance criteria to be met by the CEO that are in addition to the contractual performance criteria,” she said. “In summary, the CEO performance review process cannot be undertaken without the involvement of the CEO.” The performance review committee most recently met on April 16. Its agenda included an update on the CEO’s key performance indicators and a report titled “responses to Cr Gobbert’s comments”, which included “observations made against CEO KPIs”. Both reports were confidential. The KPI update is scheduled to be considered by the council at its April 29 meeting.