Getting ready for radical efficiency

What is radical efficiency, and how can local authorities use it to transform public services while saving money?

What is radical efficiency, and how can local authorities use it to transform public services while saving money?

Key findings

  • Radical efficiency, while not a panacea, points to a new model for local government.
  • It offers three key insights about how local authorities can create better, lower cost approaches: thinking afresh about the nature of the challenge faced by the community, using resources already available, and building new partnerships with users.
  • Using these insights, there is the potential for all services to save money while improving outcomes.

It goes without saying that local authorities are faced with making tough decisions and harsh efficiencies. This report by Innovation Unit and Nesta explains how radical efficiency represents an opportunity for them to create a positive agenda for change, and can be used by any local authority with an appetite to do much better for users, to challenge itself, and to do so in a way that will win executive and political support for radical change.

 

Innovation Unit and Nesta's Radical Efficiency programme started life as a research project, looking across the globe for examples of innovation that deliver different, better, lower cost services. This international horizon scan did two important things: it proved that much better outcomes for users that deliver significant savings are possible; and it taught us something about how those innovators went about it - and how we could, too. 

 

This booklet is grounded in the evidence we have generated to show that the radical efficiency framework can help generate much better outcomes for users. It is also about the tools and conditions and processes that will allow radical efficiency to be successful in your area.

 

Authors

Innovation Unit and Nesta