NEVER has the arrival of a council officer proved so contentious.

Manjeet Gill may have only begun work at Bournemouth Town Hall last week but the merits of her job (or “non job” as the Taxpayers’ Alliance would have it) have dominated the news agenda for months.

Because, make no mistake about it, Bournemouth council has made hard work of finding this Director for Business Improvement, formerly Director of Transformation.

After shunning an internal recruitment exercise, the council hired specialist head-hunters to help them find the perfect candidate – only to then award the job to BIC boss Peter Gunn.

But, in a further twist, it was subsequently agreed that he would remain in his current post and the search began again.

No specialist head-hunters needed this time as chief executive Pam Donnellan told councillors she had found the perfect person.

Cue a last-minute scrutiny panel meeting to discuss whether the council really wants a new £80,000 a year, four-day-a-week employee, before Manjeet could finally start her new post.

If Manjeet is fazed by this turn of events, she doesn’t show it. The former Salisbury chief executive, who has also worked at Rushmoor, Nottingham, Northampton, Northampton-shire, Bristol and Leicester councils, said she is only interested in the job in hand. “The opposition members who went to the paper and expressed concerns have all been very professional,” she said.

“The ones I have spoken to have told me it wasn’t anything personal. They have a duty as the opposition, they have been elected by the residents to question public spending.

“They have spoken to me and hopefully feel reassured that the reason why I am here helps to address some of those concerns.”

That would be the savings of up to £7.2million every year that Ms Gill is tasked to provide. Although she doesn’t like the words savings or efficiencies, preferring the term “more for less” instead.

“What we want to convey is this is not just cutting costs and cutting the quality of the service, it’s how we deliver more for less,” she said.

“That’s why it needs this type of role. Over the last few years, we’ve cut so much. But you just can’t carry on cutting across services, you have to radically rethink how services are delivered.”

This new approach has two main focuses. Four services are due to be outsourced to private companies and Manjeet will be responsible for drawing up the council’s specifications, negotiating the deal and ensuring it’s carefully monitored.

The second part of her role involves training up teams to look at what in-house improvements can be made in four other service areas. This will see processes broken down into stages, with every one analysed to see if it can be made simpler, better and cheaper.

“The savings are there, I can see various areas where there’s potential,” she said.

“Part of management is having time to step back and think about how services can be radically improved. But managers are now busy keeping day to day services running so we have not had the capacity to do that.

“I tend to go in and transform services. I’m not into day to day management. In terms of improving things, I’m usually more ambitious than the council I go into.”

Manjeet maintains that once she has done her job, she will be leaving Bournemouth. Her contract is one year long and she doesn’t expect it to be extended.

“I envisage leaving the council in a place where it is sustainable, when it no longer needs me,” she said.

“People do expect me to deliver. I like that, it’s exciting, it’s a challenge. Someone once said to me: ‘You don’t see things as problems, only challenges’ and I think that’s a spot-on description of me, really.

“In six months’ time, I want people to say that things are better. That’s one of the tests by which I will measure my own success. It’s my personal reputation on the line.”