And then there were five

At the start of April, when Jon Rouse walked into the Housing Corporation's head office for the first time as chief executive, he already had a plan. He knew it might not be popular with the 600 staff at the corporation's London headquarters and in its eight regional offices, but he was convinced that registered social landlords would love it.

After spending two months honing his ideas in a series of visits to 20 RSLs, he revealed the plan last Thursday (see "Rouse's main changes", right). It includes bringing investment and regulation together under the control of five regional field directors and setting up specialist efficiency, policy and procurement teams.

Rouse hopes to have his plan in place by autumn and the first – and most important – step is filling the five field director positions.

They will come from internal staff, most likely from among the eight existing investment and regulation directors (see "The contenders", right), so the sector can expect a bit of a scrap among the eight directors to secure one of the five seats at Rouse's right hand.

"I'm expecting strong internal candidates," he says. "We've got great people here." Rouse promises, though, that there will be no redundancies at either senior or more junior levels. He will make space for the new teams by deleting posts, such as director of inspection (a role that the corporation lost last year to the Audit Commission). But he promises "the head count will not change" and denies there will be any preferential treatment: "There aren't shoo-ins for any of the field director jobs; they are simply too important for that."

One RSL chief executive said, however: "I wouldn't be surprised if Rouse already knows who he wants for which job. The next few weeks should be quite interesting."

Structures
The five directors will report directly to Rouse and his new deputy Neil Hadden. "This is all about leadership – the corporation needs strong regional leadership, especially at this time," says Rouse. "At the moment we have incredibly centralised field structures that have very little do with where the government is coming from in terms of strengthening the regions and their input.

"For the associations we work with, it should result in greater clarity. They will know who is in charge in their area and who to talk to. If they want to discuss purely investment or regulation then those operations will remain separate, but if they want leadership and a strategic overview for their area, the field director will give them this."

John Carleton, the corporation's director of investment and regeneration for the North and one of the eight contenders, adds: "We're only going to invest in RSLs that are properly governed and well-managed. Investment and regulation have to inform each other, and I think everyone within the organisation and outside will welcome that.

"RSLs will fairly quickly realise they're dealing with a much more joined-up approach. It gives us much more power as a region to determine policy, and pushes responsibility out to the fields."

Judging from the initial reaction, Rouse has hit the nail on the head. John McHale, chief executive of transfer RSL Knowsley Housing Trust and one of the associations Rouse visited during his whirlwind tour, says: "This is going to lead to less bureaucracy and more efficient use of corporation time, with lighter-touch regulation for associations. It's going to be a good move."

National Housing Federation chief executive Jim Coulter says: "Having the five regional directors is a good thing. It'll make sure the end-to-end review team's concerns are implemented and matched to a clarity of direction now provided at a regional level. It also frees up the centre to concentrate more on ensuring its relationship with the Audit Commission works better.

"The only point that concerns us is ensuring, once regulation and investment are combined in the same regional office, they continue to act independently."

Despite his changes, Rouse admits he has one eye on regional assemblies' looming demands to take on the investment role that is currently the responsibility of the corporation. Yet on a trip to the corporation's Leeds office last Friday, Rouse said: "Nobody here seems to be panicking about the changes or worrying about the possibility of the regional assemblies taking our investment role."

Other members of Rouse's staff, though, are not so sure. One says: "A review like this always causes a level of uncertainty. Change is something the whole sector is facing and we have to face it too, constantly, but it's important that this is done very quickly. Any uncertainty over who is in control could trickle through the organisation, and we want to avoid that."

For Rouse, though, the changes were obvious. "I could see they needed making long before I became chief executive," he says. "The first 100 days in a new job are key in terms of making changes – to a certain extent, if you don't, you run into problems if you try to change things later on."

Meanwhile, a particular eight people will be wondering precisely where they fit into Rouse's plan.