The impact of Investors In People on Scottish Local Government Services Available to Purchase

This paper reports on the findings of qualitative fieldwork aimed at exploring the motives, financial implications and the perceived benefits of achieving the Investors In People Standard. It examines perceptions of IIP at three different organisational levels. The research found differences between the motivation for, and perceptions of, IIP at all three levels as well as differences in the perceived benefits of the Standard. The views of senior management regarding the benefits of IIP were not generally shared at the other levels of the organisation. Indeed front‐line staff felt that IIP made little difference to them personally, the way they performed their jobs, or to the levels of satisfaction of their customers. This presents a major problem for senior management of local authority services if they are to achieve all the benefits attributed to IIP and so get beyond the “plaque on the wall”.