Leadership Essentials

We are running the two-day programme for Adult Social Care and Leading Healthier Places simultaneously. These free development events will support Adult Social Care Lead Members and Chairs and Vice Chairs of Health & Wellbeing Boards with the key challenges they face in care and health in a rapidly changing policy landscape.

The events are member led, interactive, and provides lots of opportunities for discussion, the sharing of practice and innovative solutions in a confidential environment and for making valuable contacts. The programmes are delivered by LGA staff supported by high profile guest speakers from local government and partner agencies.

The programmes will explore leadership within the current policy and practice context, including the NHS White Paper and Bill, changes to public health, implications of Covid response and recovery, adult social care funding and reform, and ongoing health and care integration. Some sessions will run across the two programmes and some separately.

Dates to be announced soon.

More information on other resources for lead members can be found on the Adult social care lead member development page.

Fee: The fee for attending this programme is fully subsidised.

As councils grapple with a changing environment, financial resilience and service transformation, ensuring that the Audit Committee is functioning effectively has never been more important. Meanwhile, the pressures have grown on auditors and council staff to deliver more with less. Given all that is going on, together with the increasingly high profile that government and national bodies are giving to local council Audit Committees, it is essential that time is taken to reflect on how such committees can contribute to ensuring the council is well governed.

Aimed at Audit Committee chairs, this programme will discuss how Audit Committees can be most effective. Drawing on the insights of regulators and practitioners it will provide space for participants to reflect on the way their Committee functions and how it can gain maximum assurance that the council’s governance arrangements are fit for purpose.

Dates to be announced soon.

Fee: The cost of attending this programme is fully subsidised.

This exciting programme from the LGA has been designed to meet a significant unmet need in the member development world - a course to support new and experienced cabinet members to be successful in their portfolios.  There are many courses available for scrutiny councillors but this is the first course dedicated to supporting councillors in their role as executive members. The course is equally suited to policy committee chairs at councils operating the committee system.

This interactive course examines the key aspects of being a successful cabinet member - from having a clear understanding of the legacy you want to leave, to working with your director, working with other cabinet members, making effective decisions and managing your workload.  The course is designed to produce a step change in the effectiveness of cabinet members and policy committee chairs. It is designed to support all different types of portfolio holders - and is not specific to a specific portfolio.

Who is it for?

• new cabinet members or policy committee chairs
• experienced cabinet members/chairs wanting a ‘refresh’
• cabinet deputies or assistants
• shadow cabinet members or assistants.

Programme 25: Saturday 12 July – Sunday 13 July 2025 – Warwick Conferences, Coventry, CV4 7SH                                        
Programme 26: Thursday 27 November – Friday 28 November 2025 – Warwick Conferences, Coventry, CV4 7SH

Fee: The fee for attending the two day residential event is £250 per place which includes accommodation, meals, and all learning materials. The fee for the virtual programme is £99.

Lead Members for Children's Services are responsible for providing leadership to Children's Services in their area and hold a statutory role. This development event is funded as part of the sector led improvement programme and aims to support Lead Members with the key challenges they face in the changing policy landscape and to develop leadership capacity, share learning and provide a valuable networking opportunity. This programme is also for Chairs of Children's Services scrutiny committee.

The programme runs over two days and is delivered by member peers and LGA staff supported by guest speakers from local government and partner agencies. 

Further sessions to be confirmed, for more information and to be placed on a waitlist please contact  or telephone 020 7664 3054.[email protected]

Fee: The fee for attending this programme is fully subsidised.

An opportunity for those in political roles that lead, influence, and shape the agenda of Children’s Services to come together and support you to drive and embed improvements in your Local Authorities.

At this in-person event means you will have the chance to hear from and have reflective discussions and workshops with, expert speakers and peers from different local authorities.

It is also an opportunity to learn about a breadth of topics relevant to our current context. 

This learning event is aimed at experienced members with the children’s portfolio, education portfolio and chairs of scrutiny, ideally having done the Essentials course more than a year ago and/or been in role at least 12 months.

Further sessions to be confirmed, for more information and to be placed on a waitlist please contact [email protected] or telephone 020 7664 3054.

Fee: The fee for attending this programme is fully subsidised.

As a leading councillor you play a pivotal role in raising awareness of your local area and organisation through the media. We’re running an intense five-hour virtual masterclass to develop and enhance interview skills. 

The session will be run by Scott Chisholm, who advises some of the country’s top politicians and the world’s most influential corporate executives. You will learn:

• how to be in control of any encounter with any journalist
• how to prepare and present
• how a journalist thinks
• what makes news, news
• your rights
• how to exploit difficult questions
• how to influence, rather than merely inform
• the 3 ‘R’s of damage imitation and crisis management.

Programme 38: Friday 18 July 2025 - Warwick Conferences, Coventry, CV4 7SH 

Fee: The fee for attending this programme is fully subsidised.

Leadership essentials culture event for portfolio holders

The LGA and Arts Council England are running a free-to-attend face-to-face event, for elected members with the responsibility for culture.

Aims of the programme:

• To support culture portfolio holders to be exceptional leaders of arts and culture in their places during the period of economic uncertainty and COVID rebuild, and beyond.
• To increase and refresh the tools and knowledge culture portfolio holders have to be cultural leaders through peer to peer sharing and learning.
• To share a wide range of inspiring and relevant case studies presented in an engaging way by local authority peers and external speakers.
• To encourage attendees to network, share information, knowledge and expertise peer to peer and to respect confidentiality.
• To ensure that culture portfolio holders are aware of the strategic work of ACE and the longstanding partnership with the LGA. To support opportunities to work more closely with ACE and to access support and resources.
• To ensure that culture portfolio holders are aware of the key role of councils in arts and culture, the potential for arts and culture to deliver across council agendas and that they are able to articulate this potential and these benefits.

Format:

• The programme will consist of a cohort of up to 20 delegates who will be taken on the leadership journey, featuring the opportunity to hear topical updates and case studies and to network with councillors across the country.
• Each member of the cohort will identify a specific challenge they are facing in their locality at the beginning of the programme and will have the opportunity to work through this challenge along with other colleagues across the sector. These challenges will be submitted ahead of the programme in an agreed format and circulated among other participants ahead of the course. All responses will be treated anonymously when circulated to the cohort, as the Leadership Essentials programme is designed to create an honest and open space for delegates to discuss challenges and share knowledge.
• The participants will be supported by access and signposting to a wide range of relevant LGA and ACE resources. 

Dates to be announced soon.

Fee: The cost of attending this programme is fully subsidised. This includes accommodation, meals, course materials and tuition.

The Leadership Essentials: Effective Scrutiny two day programme is for new or aspiring scrutiny chairs or task-and-finish group review lead members covering: 

• leading and managing a scrutiny review
• ensuring impact of scrutiny recommendations
• increasing participation by members and the public
• chairing scrutiny meetings in all their forms.

Drawing on experts in their field, the programme will also offer the opportunity to focus in depth on the hot topics that are currently most relevant to your work, whether that is children’s safeguarding, welfare reform, changes in health services or pressure on budgets driving major changes in how services are delivered or commissioned.

Programme 26: Thursday 25 September – Friday 26 September 2025 – Warwick Conferences, Coventry, CV4 7SH
Programme 27: Saturday 24 January – Sunday 25 January 2026 – Warwick Conferences, Coventry, CV4 7SH

Fee: The fee for attending the two day residential event is £250 per place which includes accommodation, meals and all learning materials. The fee for the virtual programme is £99.

This two day residential programme will help leaders and finance portfolio holders get to grips with the financial challenges facing their authority.  The course discusses setting longer term strategies for sustainability as well as balancing the budget on an annual basis and how to work with officers to ensure that the Council is making the most of its opportunities. 

Dates to be announced soon.

Fee: The fee for attending this programme is fully subsidised, but places are limited and will be offered on a strict first come first served basis.

This exciting new course will de-mystify the financial elements of your portfolio or the policy committee that you chair. While all councillors understand the current financial pressures and their importance, many councillors – including cabinet members and policy committee chairs - find local government finance difficult to understand and hard to navigate. Too often financial leadership is left to the cabinet member for finance or relevant committee chair but all leading members need to understand finances and be comfortable with their financial roles. 

The course is aimed specifically for non-finance portfolio holders/policy committee chairs, supporting their financial roles by:

• Increasing non-finance cabinet members’ understanding of the contemporary local government finance system and likely future developments in the system.
• Providing tools and practical advice to enable cabinet members to navigate their own authorities’ financial systems and controls.
• Increasing the confidence of cabinet members in developing constructive relationships with key financial managers (including the section 151 officer).
• Enabling participants to identify and specify the financial management elements of a portfolio’s role. Enabling participants to better integrate financial information with non-financial service performance information.

Interactive, practical and engaging – and high accessible for cabinet members less comfortable with the financial aspects of their portfolio.

Fee: The fee for attending this programme is fully subsidised. 

Who is it for?

• non-finance portfolio holders
• non-finance deputy/assistant cabinet members
• shadow cabinet members
• non finance Committee chairs from committee systems.

Dates to be announced soon.

With finance in every local council getting ever tighter, it is even more important that every council makes sure that it has a culture and systems to ensure that finance is well governed and controlled. Good governance starts at full Council and every councillor has a role to play, but what does good financial governance look like? These two online sessions will explore this question.               

Dates to be announced soon.

Fee: The fee for attending this programme is fully subsidised.  

To book email [email protected]

Fire Leadership Essentials to support Fire and Rescue Authority (FRA) members with their responsibilities.   By the end of the course, delegates will have had the opportunity to: 

• Develop a comprehensive understanding of the fire sector, including clarity on duties and responsibilities
• Develop skills around leadership in fire and rescue authorities (FRAs).
• Gain a thorough understanding of scrutiny and governance in FRAs and practical skills to apply that understanding.
• Improve knowledge of the key strategic issues facing the sector, including fire reform, building safety, the fire inspections regime and issues around culture, inclusion and diversity in the fire sector and climate change.
• Share ideas and network with leading members from a variety of FRAs. 

We encourage all fire members to attend a fire programme as an induction to the fire sector and as an opportunity to network with other fire members.

Dates to be announced soon.

Fee: The cost of attending this programme is fully subsidised.

This event will provide councillors with the new ideas, strategies and techniques for achieving more effective communication with both internal and external audiences. Participants will learn how to:

• influence others towards achieving mutually beneficial objectives
• adapt their communication style to convey messages more persuasively to people who have a different communication style
• be more effective when delivering and managing bad news
• develop a more authoritative communication style
• Build and promote their own personal brand
• target the right message at the right audience and establish trust and credibility and build relationships
• overcome barriers to effective communication
• select the best tools and methods for delivering messages.

Programme 11: Saturday 10 January – Sunday 11 January 2026 - Warwick Conferences, Coventry, CV4 7SH

Fee: The fee for attending the two day residential event is £250 per place which includes accommodation, meals and all learning materials.

The role of Health & Wellbeing Boards as leaders/ anchors of place has long been championed by the LGA. The importance of place is also championed in many recent government papers and policy, including the Integration White Paper, Levelling Up White Paper and changes to the health and care architecture as a result of the 2022 Health and Care Act. 

The changes in governance structures provide a timely opportunity for place-based health and care partnerships including Health and Wellbeing Boards (HWBs) to explore the strengths of partnership working and culture at place and within the changing landscape, review short and long-term priorities – with renewed focus on local health inequalities working towards creating impactful change and better outcomes for their population.  

The offer supports leaders in this context including with the increasing difficulty of getting health partners to participate. NHS partners are focusing on ICS recovery issues and financial issues. This support helps navigate the challenging context, the world of inspection. 

This Leadership Essentials course is for political leadership of place within the ICS/ICP context. If you are a Health & Wellbeing Board chair/co-chair/vice-chair, elected member on a HWB board, portfolio holder/have executive responsibility for public health, health, wellbeing, then this Leadership Essentials course is for you.

These sessions will give elected members an opportunity to come together to have space to think and reflect, share experiences and actively learn from each other through the LGA’s tried and tested approach to leadership development. The sessions will be co-chaired by local authority and health colleagues with speakers from across local government and other partners. The programme will support participants to consider: 

• The national, regional, system and place context for Health and Wellbeing Boards including public health and prevention
• The role and purpose of the HWB within complexity; beyond the statutory duties in the landscape of ICSs, ICPs, ICBs, place-based partnership
• Effective leadership and delivery at place
• How governance arrangements enable collaboration and impactful and effective decision-making 

Dates to be announced soon.

Fee: The cost of attending this programme is fully subsidised.

Decision making at licensing committee: how to run a good licensing committee – for licensing committee/sub-committee chairs and vice-chairs

This leadership essentials programme is perfect for those councillors who are new and getting to grips with their role of chair or vice chair on the licensing committee, as well as for more experienced committee members as a refresher and update.

Licensing, and the decisions made by licensing committees, make a fundamental contribution to shaping places where people want to live, work and relax. The aim of the licensing committee must be that those people they engage with are satisfied with the decision making process, if not always the outcome.

Chairing a committee, and all the preparation and lead-in required for good decision making, can be challenging. This course will focus on good quality decision making at licensing committee and how a good licensing committee is run. It also touches on where licensing links in with wider council priorities. Attendees will be able to compare how their committee operates with other authorities and share ideas with other councillors.

Dates to be announced soon..

The LGA is offering a series of regional one-day masterclasses for councillors across the political spectrum to explore how councils can best respond to cohesion issues in their localities. Hearing from expert academics and leading organisations, the sessions will provide an opportunity for attendees to discuss sensitive issues in a safe space, share experiences and consider the role of elected members in tackling extremism and building community cohesion.

The courses are open to all elected members and are free of charge. Each event runs from 10.00am – 17.00pm.

Dates are now confirmed for Warwick Conferences on Wednesday, 13 November and Leeds, Wednesday, 11 December, with further courses expected to be announced in Manchester and Newcastle shortly. 

For more details and to book a place, please contact [email protected] 

What is the role of elected members in the risk management process? Can’t this be left to the Audit Committee? What should we do with the risk register that the officers report to us?

There is truth in the cliché that the greatest risk for councils in the current climate is to take no risk. Consequently, every council has had to develop strategies to transform the way they deliver services, whilst ensuring that the council’s finances remain resilient. However, recent government and audit reports written where such strategies have run into difficulties have highlighted that elected members are not as engaged as they should be in ensuring that risk is effectively managed throughout the authority.  

This seminar will enable participants to develop their understanding of how risk should be identified, assessed, and managed throughout the council. Please bring a copy of your latest risk register with you to the seminar as there will be plenty of time for you to reflect upon the risk management process at your council.

Programme 10: Thursday 6 November 2025 - Warwick Conferences, Coventry, CV4 7S

Fee: The fee for attending this programme is fully subsidised.

Following demand, the LGA and Sport England are piloting a return to face-to-face delivery of the popular Leadership Essentials: Sport programme. 

Aims of the programme

The programme supports elected members to: 

• Engage with Sport England’s new ten-year Strategy ‘Uniting the Movement’, that continues to champion sport and physical activity’s ability to make better places to live and bring people together, and explore how taking a place-based approach can help tackle the barriers to activity .
• Develop in their role to lead the design of a local sport, physical activity and movement offer that improves activity levels and the health and wellbeing of local communities, contributes to reducing the burden on social care, tackles health inequalities, contributes to levelling up activity and encourages connected communities.
• Develop knowledge and insight of other policy areas to better lead a collaborative approach to harnessing the power of sport, physical activity and movement to improve lives in their place.
• Explore their own approach to leadership in collaborative partnerships and see how leadership is important in influencing system change, identifying and pursuing development needs as appropriate
• Create fit for purpose sport and physical activity opportunities with diminishing resources, focusing on the assets of their spaces and places – including leisure facilities and developing more active environments.
• Understand more about how Sport England and the LGA can help and support councillors to lead change and become better leaders for their places. 

Dates to be announced soon.

Fee: The fee for attending this programme is fully subsidised. This includes accommodation, meals, course materials and tuition.

In recent years, it’s become increasingly clear that councils must change and adapt to meet the constantly evolving needs and aspirations of the people they serve. To achieve this councils have been innovating and implementing transformation programmes across every council service, with the goal of achieving organisations that are more efficient and able to better react to the issues of today.

These programmes will give councillors the confidence, capability, and awareness to shape and lead the transformation agenda within their local authorities and local areas. It is also an opportunity to introduce any newly elected councillors to the concept of transformation, giving them the skills to become the next generation of transformational leaders.  

Dates to be announced soon.

The cost of attending this programme will be fully subsidised. This includes accommodation, meals, course materials and tuition.