Leadership

For Foreign Office chief Simon Fraser, his relationships around Whitehall are as crucial as those with Washington. His main mission is to increase trade, he tells Matt Ross, and that means working with a host of other departments

Soon after the 2010 election, the coalition beefed up departmental boards and recruited a set of powerful non-executive directors. Joshua Chambers meets Lord Browne, the ‘lead NED’ reforming Whitehall from the inside

The relationship between ministers and the civil service must improve and both groups’ accountability must be clarified, Dame Gillian Morgan, the retiring permanent secretary of the Welsh Assembly Government, has told CSW.

Sir Mark Walport is to become the government’s next chief scientific adviser in April 2013, it has been announced. He was chosen via an open competition, and replaces Sir John Beddington.

Does the quality of your work make your time more valuable than that of your peers? Four top officials gave their thoughts on performance-related pay during a panel discussion. Suzannah Brecknell was listening

Following their January debut, the civil service’s leading duo are taking the stage again – this time to champion the Civil Service Reform Plan. Matt Ross asks about politicisation, centralisation, and unwelcome press attention

Good ideas on policymaking meet risky ones on accountability

Since last year, the PM and DPM have been noisily pushing for the rapid implementation of coalition policies. Matt Ross meets Will Cavendish, whose job it is to chivvy departments into delivering on the government’s promises

Cabinet secretary Jeremy Heywood is “angry” at attacks on the civil service in the newspapers over the past month, and the prime minister and deputy prime minister share that anger, Heywood told the Public Administration Select Committee last week.

The papers have been full of frothy stories and silly stereotypes about the civil service, says Mark Lowcock. This risks distracting us from the real – and very important – challenge of adapting to the tasks at hand