The gospel according to Jim

Jim Coulter has spent the past two years making sure this Wednesday's launch of social housing's new identity goes well. The chief executive of the National Housing Federation has been to about 200 meetings and brainstorming sessions; calmed and cajoled numerous chief executives and staked his reputation on the £1m rebranding exercise. "For me, it's a fundamental thing," he says. "I wouldn't be here if this wasn't happening. And the way I see it, I won't be here if it doesn't."

For Coulter, the process that started in 2001 as Housing's Better Future and has morphed – with the help of rebranding guru Wally Olins – into In Business for Neighbourhoods is all about this change: changing the approach of housing associations to ensure people are more satisfied with where they live and changing the leadership of chief executives. He points out that tenants and residents have a "lack of trust and respect" for associations, an outlook that chief executives have not done enough to challenge.

He is extremely tough on chief executives that are guilty of this laxity. "It's a mistake to think that when you get up in the morning, go to the bathroom and look in the mirror, that's the best thing you'll see all day," he says. "In some cases, it's the worst thing you'll see all day. It's this sense of humility that we have to acquire. We need to be important because of what we do, not self-important because of who we think we are."

This means you
"Anybody who says 'this is not for us' has to answer the question, 'why?'", he says. "I'm a little sceptical of organisations that say 'we really support the objectives, but we're so worried that we'll be let down by other people, that we won't join in'. I'm sure people will come up with that argument, but I think it is thin to the point of approaching nonsense. If they are that good, why is it not their ambition to lever up the performance of those that are not as good as they are?"

For a man who has spent much of his time at the helm of the NHF trying to hold together an increasingly disparate membership, this is dangerous talk, but he is utterly serious.

According to Coulter, the area in which RSL chief executives most need a change in attitude is in their approach to antisocial behaviour. It's "one of the strongest areas of tenant and resident feedback", he says. "Housing associations need to become better at dealing with antisocial behaviour. There are lots of other things, but it is the unavoidable heart of dealing with reputation. Performance will produce trust and that's the only thing that really matters."

Coulter hopes that, over time, this drive for excellence will allow RSLs to press for the greater autonomy granted to the best-performing councils. He sees this as at least two to three years down the road but the 10-15-year timescale for "In", as NHF staff call the rebranding project, is longer than this.

The lessons of history
The pressure's on, but Coulter still finds the time to travel to his native North-east most weekends to relax. His method to escape the madness? Serving breakfast and mowing the lawn at his partner's guesthouse just outside Berwick-upon-Tweed.

"It is a small place in Ford, near Berwick," he says. "I don't normally talk about private matters but I make a very good Basil Fawlty." That comparison might apply on more than one level; he has a reputation for not suffering fools gladly.

So would Coulter stake his reputation on the rebranding exercise? ‘Yes, why not?’ he says. ‘It’s something I believe in.'

He is driven, he says, by the "injustices I saw growing up in the North-east in the 1950s" and a frustration with people who stick to the status quo. "I went to St Cuthbert's Grammar School. It was run by priests. One day one of the old priests took me aside and said: 'Coulter my boy, you've got to learn to put your non-conformity to more constructive uses.' I replied under my breath, but ever since it's fair to say I heeded his advice." Before jobs with the TUC and Unison (then NALGO), Coulter studied history at the University of London – a degree that, he says, he never used until he took the top job at the NHF in 1988.

Now 58, he is no great believer in nostalgic longing for a mystical time when tenants were supposedly much happier with their social landlords – what he refers to as "putting on the Hovis music": "There is a great interest in the past in the sector and in how good it used to be, as opposed to changing it and making sure that the future is what's important," he says.

Prescott over your shoulder
Behind Coulter's desk at the NHF's London headquarters, stuck on top of another framed picture, is a photocopied shot of deputy prime minister John Prescott and an aide sporting sunglasses and looking like bit players in Reservoir Dogs. He describes it as an office prank, but Coulter is all too aware of Prescott looking over his shoulder, demanding progress on the Communities Plan. For Coulter, this is yet another reason to drive his pet project forward.

However, he bristles at the suggestion that the strategy is down largely to him and Richard McCarthy. "If it was about one individual – whether me or Richard – I think we would have got it wrong, actually.

It’s this sense of humility that we have to acquire. We need to be important because of what we do, not self-important because of who we think we are

We would really have got it wrong.

"I have no compunction in saying that, both as individuals and working together, it's been important for us to have done this and to have shifted people's attitudes and perceptions. I'm equally clear that the important thing is to spread that ownership and that has been done. There are a lot of people who own this."

Yet according to Simon Dow, chief executive of the Guinness Trust and former chief executive of the Housing Corporation, Coulter should not underestimate his own importance. "A significant part of the support for the federation is a personal vote of confidence in Coulter," he says. "He's done an extraordinary job of keeping it a broad church with a united front."

"Church" is the operative word here: despite being known for being no fan of organised religion, Coulter is evangelical about In Business for Neighbourhoods and desperate for other people to share his faith.

The rebranding exercise has been controversial since it was announced; but Coulter is sure that community players such as councils and health trusts are signed up to the same modernising agenda and that the efforts of RSLs – 100 of whom have already agreed to help him spread the new NHF gospel – will not be in vain.