Development management (DM) teams are working with some of the biggest public service challenges today. The recent Housing White Paper sets the challenge to build 250,00 new homes a year. Councils and others are working hard to encourage investors and developers to invest and build in their areas as part of their regeneration plans. None of this can happen without the planning permissions needed. And working with the DM team is often a developer’s first practical experience of the development opportunity the Council has offered them. 
 
So, it’s important that DM teams are well-prepared to meet these challenges of increased demand and high expectation about customer service. And they must do so in a climate of reducing resources. Put simply, to do more, faster and better with less. 
 
To many, whose understanding of DM teams comes often from the picture of the unpredictable, painfully slow and generally unhelpful caricature town planner painted by TV property programmes, the chances of meeting this challenge seem poor. 
 
But DM teams across the country are meeting this challenge and more. They have also been developing their commercial thinking and commercial behaviour as part of extending their service offerings to include traded services. These new services bring new income to reduce the need for budget reductions and provide a better and wider range of services for their customers. 
 
Mondrem has been helping some of these DM services to: 
 
Make the applications process for small schemes run quickly and efficiently so that more time can be spent supporting the larger schemes that bring investment in their local areas. 
Improve the speed, quality and customer experience of the applications process for large schemes, helping to attract future investment. 
 
Here’s what some of them said about the impact from working with Mondrem: 
 
“Feels better. Looks better. The experience for people is better.” 
 
“Massive impact short-term. Meeting SLAs and targets.” 
 
“…the right mix between being supportive and being challenging.” 
 
To find out more about how Mondrem can help you meet the DM challenge, contact mike.astbury@mondrem.co.uk 
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