It's a risk leaving a job where you've enjoyed some success for one where there is no guarantee that you can repeat the trick. But if you're ambitious and you're head hunted it's hard to say no  - especially if the recruiting authority claims to be in a financially much healthier position than your current authority.  

So much time and energy is taken up avoiding bankruptcy and coming up with ways of living within reduced means there is no opportunity to build, to create something special, to really show what you can do given some room for  manoeuvre and some resources.

So it's not always a case of moving up to a bigger authority or one with a higher profile. Occasionally it's about the head hunters catching you at the right time, maybe the deteriorating financial situation is putting a strain on the once harmonious and mutually supportive relationship with the leader/chair. The majority party's majority could be reduced to one, with the result emboldening those who don't share the leader's vision and replacing cooperation between parties with antagonism. The atmosphere within the authority has changed. The prospect of working somewhere where the aim is more than survival is tempting.

Yet it still comes as a surprise when someone moves just 20 miles up the road to an authority that is no bigger and whose profile is much the same. Likewise their financial position is no less precarious and therefore controversy and unpopular decisions are still on the agenda. What we don't know is what promises were made. What we do know is the internal strife within political parties nationally will still be reflected locally whether that's a local MP at odds with the council or councillors in the same party vying for its soul.

So why move? I recently heard one chief executive explain his imminent departure to his existing staff by saying he was a life-long supporter of the local football club! One thing for sure it's rarely for a big pay rise. That climate has gone. Maybe it's a case of the grass is always greener -  even though experience tells us different.

I do remember a conversation with my mentor in which I express frustration following an unsuccessful series of job interviews. His response was: ‘Do you like your current job, do you get on with your colleagues? Well, if yes, why would you want to go anywhere else?' I was reminded of those wise words recently when I learned of a former colleague who was tempted away from an ambitious authority trying to move into the big league by another a few miles up the road only to be sacked eighteen months later for lack of progress.

Blair Mcpherson is a former social worker and local government director, and an author and blogger www.blairmcpherson.co.uk