All organisations need to do more with less. Effective technology is key to squaring this circle. We understand technology, but more importantly we understand what your business needs technology to do. We can simplify the jargon and are experts at providing a bridge between business and technical communities.
We are often called to act as a critical friend to challenge the business and IT communities to help deliver effectively.
Particular areas of expertise include:
- Information management
- IT strategy and governance
- Web strategy
- Service continuity
- Strategic options review
- EDRM and CRM Programme support
Our business led approach to technology and information management complements our vision for excellent authorities to give councils the confidence that they are using the right technology in the right way. The following table illustrates how effective techology provides a foundation for:
| Hunger to learn | A performance management system that tells individuals, their colleagues and their managers when they've done well and where they need to improve, significantly motivates peformance improvement. |
| High energy | Online self-service for staff and workflow systems ensure staff feel that they are expending their effort on their job, not on bureaucracy. |
| Citizen insight | Scattered across your authority you will have huge amounts of information on your citizens. With ICT you can bring that information together and turn it into insight to reconfigure your spending and the design of your services. |
| Smart resourcing | A good, clear and usable ERP systems empowers managers and their staff to deliver top quality innovative services while allowing senior managers to enhance financial budgetary control. |
| Internal trust | A really good intranet ensures all staff have their finger on the pulse, which in turn instills the confidence that others are striving as hard as they are. |
| Capacity to refresh | Through automation and worflow, thoughtfully designed ICT systems, 'owned' by the people who use them, can reduce the number of people you need to employ to do the same tasks and improve the consistency and quality of those tasks. |
| Natural partners | A shared local information system, in which all partners' data is gathtered and presented in a useful way , dramatically improves understanding across partners and significantly decreases the time between identification of an issue and action. |
For more information on the work we do in technology and how we go about it, please call Chris Hall on 020 7808 1125 or email chris.hall@rseconsulting.co.uk
Case Study: London Borough of Redbridge
Over the past two years we have delivered a number of interlinked projects for London Borough of Redbridge to redefine the role of their ICT function. In addition to acting as an objective critical friend we have specifically worked on projects to baseline their infrastructure and service capacity, develop a new technical architecture, undertake market review and business cases for investment in new technology, led the procurement of a new telephony system and design of web personalization functionality including collaborative filtering and content syndication to reduce management costs and increase stickiness. The overall impact of these changes has been an improvement in day to day performance for users, a reduction in reactive working for ICT staff and the development of a new dialogue with senior managers about the value ICT can bring.
The London Borough of Redbridge's ground breaking website, Redbridge-i, has been acknowledged as one of the top four innovations in local government by the Audit Commission and the I&DeA in their report published on the 13th of March. RSe is delighted for our client and proud to have played a role in turning Redbridge i into a reality.
Chris Hall, RSe's Director for Information and Technology, said: "This website shows that local government is capable of emulating the best websites in the world, such as Amazon and Google. It is a powerful platform for cost-effective customer focused services and one we think other authorities should replicate."
Additional resources
Transformational Government for Local Authorities (in conjunction with IdEA) http://www.cio.gov.uk/documents/pdf/transgov/trans_local_gov060328.pdf
The Importance of Business Continuity
Introduction to Information Management
Developing a Successful Online Strategy
“RSe has combined technical expertise with a clear understanding of Redbridge's objectives and priorities to provide us with a clear blueprint for the future. Most importantly, the way in which RSe involved our key stakeholders in developing the blueprint has generated a great deal of commitment to the recommendations and genuine excitement about implementing them.”
Lee Edwards
Chief Information & Business Systems Officer, London Borough of Redbridge