In the second and final part of the interview, David Moody discussed marginal investment in technology vis - a vis savings, aligning technology with a holistic service view as well as local government assessment.
Question 3
Local authorities are aware that they need to invest in technology, but how can they make sure this investment delivers measurable results for them and their citizens rather than simply satisfying a list of requirements issued by central government?
I think that local authorities need to align the use of technology with a holistic view of service.
It’s important to step back at times and look at the rationale behind initiatives and instructions being introduced. Central government certainly doesn’t set out to impose a set of measures that are not designed to deliver benefits and I think we all need to look at the bigger picture of what we want to achieve.
Certainly, I’d say that those of Lagan’s customers that have focused on service delivery, achieving customer satisfaction, procuring technology with a demonstrated return on investment and listening to their own employees and service users have performed well against central government requirements. I’d say that’s because they have looked at the spirit of the requirement and been confident in making the choices that will deliver best benefit to their customers rather than concentrating on getting through their next assessment.
Question four
What examples can you cite of a small marginal investment in technology delivering efficiency, innovation and cost savings? How did the local authority achieve these results?
There are many examples I could give you here. If properly thought through and - let me go back to the previous question here – selected because of the benefits it can deliver rather than simply to tick a central government box – a relatively small investment in technology can yield enormous efficiency improvements and cost savings.
Clearly the examples that are most familiar to me are our own customers and I’m going to refer here to Argyll & Bute council in Scotland in particular. By integrating Lagan’s Enterprise Case Management (ECM) solution with its telephony system, and using Lagan adapters to link revenues and benefits from front office to back office, Argyll and Bute Council in Scotland is saving the equivalent of 8.5 full-time employees - a cost reduction of £765,000 over five years. It has also successfully reduced the volume of lost calls from 25% to just 4% and is fully satisfying 90% of calls at the first point of contact.
Other examples of innovation include the recently launched Citizens Connect application for iPhone users which allows citizens to become the eyes and ears of their local government mentioned above. If residents see uncollected rubbish, fresh graffiti or a pothole that needs attention, they can simply take a picture of it on their Smartphone and email it to the relevant council contact for processing. The system has been rolled out in Boston in the USA to great success and is creating great interest in the UK too.
We are also seeing solutions being adopted in wider areas now, including social housing. Hounslow Homes has been one of the frontrunners here, and is reporting customer satisfaction up by 13%, a 33% reduction in repair call logging time (6 to 4 minutes), a 33% reduction in back office staff and £378K pa cost saving (front office staff reduced from 30.5 to 16.5 FTE).
We can add to this Sevenoaks Council which has achieved savings of £100,000 due to process improvements, and the City and County of San Francisco which achieved ROI on its 311 single non-emergency application within just seven months.
Councils will find that much of the technology they need to make savings and increase efficiency is readily available, but may require imaginative thinking if it is to be deployed to best effect. It could well be possible to build on existing systems to meet the needs of new service areas without procuring a costly new solution, which would clearly be of great interest.
How important is it for local authorities to have in-house IT expertise if they are to drive maximum ROI from technology investments?
There’s not a black and white answer to this. Of course having some in-house IT expertise is going to help, but the specific skills required will depend very much on what approach the local authority decides to adopt in implementing technology investments.
While we can't deny the importance of in-house skills, local authorities also need the flexibility to respond to business drivers, and that may mean buying some skills in as they are needed.
I'd say that local authorities have three broad options: IT or business process outsourcing where one service or process may be outsourced; a traditional enterprise software solution; a SaaS solution where IT is handled entirely by a supplier. The problems come where councils are keen to be self-sufficient but either lack the skills internally, or are simply not aware of what’s out there.
I think it’s always worth a local authority casting around for advice and best practice examples before committing to technology investments. At Lagan, we work with over 180 government agencies across five continents and that body of expertise often proves invaluable to customers. In fact, we recently launched a 'Lagan on Demand' SaaS offering which is a preconfigured toolkit that councils can try before buying. Local authorities can be up and running with a CRM system in 30 days with zero capital investment and no software to install.
Whether the correct IT expertise comes from within the local authority or from an external supplier, without it, maximum ROI will not be achieved. However we should remember that IT expertise is just one cog in the overall engine; you also need the right people from the top down to drive change and improvements.
Question six
Do you believe central government’s methods of assessing local authorities are effective, or is there too much focus on reporting rather than outcomes?
That’s potentially quite a political question!
Certainly, there are well publicised examples of situations in UK government where an objective has driven the wrong set of behaviours. More specifically, we know of local authorities who have (in our view, rightly) complained that certain reporting requirements actually got in the way of delivering the right outcomes for their citizens. But I think that we need to think about the motives behind some of these reporting requirements. They are not generally imposed to create paperwork, but rather to ensure that complex budget decisions are made effectively. If councils take a sensible line in delivering the services they know are needed in the most effective and economical way possible, they’ll find themselves ticking the right reporting boxes as a matter of course, without becoming bogged down in reporting for reporting’s sake.
I also think that looking ahead, there will be greater debate about where decision-making power is vested, and there will be calls for local authorities to have greater control over how they spend their limited resources. The flip side of that is that I think they will also be required to become increasingly accountable for their spending decisions. That’s something we’re seeing in the US right now, with government agencies required to publish where their money goes.