No-one told him

The hoo-ha at Winchester Cathedral is of interest to Beeboids because of the position, now resigned, of former acting DG Mark Byford as Senior Non-Executive Director.  He joined the Chapter in 2017. The review of what went wrong at the Cathedral over the past twelve months says the seeds were earlier. 

Prior to April 2024 there were a series of contributory factors which cannot be described in detail because of the need for confidentiality in personal and HR matters.

Nevertheless, we can say that these amounted to:

• A failure to appropriately manage people, including the management of poor performance, unacceptable behaviour and contractual changes. Some challenging behaviour led to dysfunction in the Senior Executive Team
• A failure to share information appropriately. This includes who needed to be aware of various allegations and investigations, and what information should be included and considered in an investigation
• A culture of secrecy, due to a misunderstanding of appropriate confidentiality and the aversion of key individuals to conflict
• Failures in communication. These were wide-ranging and included the failure to consult on and share the music strategy with key stakeholders, including lay clerks and chorister parents. 

No-one gets fingered by the review by name, though Dean Catherine Ogle has decided to resign. The authors seem to think Mr Byford's only problem was that no-one told him what was occurring...

Despite their best endeavours, which were significant, the Non-Executive Members of Chapter and Mr Mark Byford, as Senior Non Executive Member (who worked tirelessly, in his role, to address the issues of concern) were often not fully in possession of the relevant facts which prevented them from playing their proper part in addressing the challenges the Cathedral faced. Given the significant experience of those on Chapter, including the non-executive members, their full knowledge of certain issues during this time could have led to different decisions and therefore different outcomes.