Agenda item

INFORMATION NOTE OF THE CUSTOMER & DIGITAL SERVICES MANAGER

 

To provide a brief presentation on the Council's digital transformation programme to date.

Councillor Ian Albert, as Executive Member for Finance and IT, presented the information note entitled ‘Digital Transformation Programme Update’ and invited the Customer and Digital Services Manager to give a presentation on the Digital Transformation Programme, following which Members asked questions. 

Audio Recording – 1 hour 13 minutes 22 seconds

 

Councillor Ian Albert, as Executive Member for Finance and IT, introduced the Information Note entitled ‘Digital Transformation Programme Update’ and advised that:

 

·             The Digital Transformation Programme was a critical initiative and was a key tool in the Council Delivery Plan.

·             Despite challenges such as public sector recruitment and retention, multiple business applications and a lack of synergy between applications, the IT Team had made significant progress on the programme.

·             In 2024, the Customer Relation Management (CRM) system contract had ended, but this had allowed the Council to explore other digital platforms.

·             After extensive research and testing, it was decided to go with a low code solution called Netcall which allowed users to create digital applications with minimal coding skills and had allowed the Council to accelerate its own digital transformation and create a Digital Transformation Strategy that was approved by Cabinet in January 2024.

·             Several goals in the strategy had been achieved including the investment in the low code digital platform, the implementation of a chatbot service, the integration of SharePoint, and signing a digital declaration introduced by the Government which many other councils nationally had also signed.

·             Ongoing projects included making services digital by default, conducting a customer-centric review of end-to-end processes and experimenting with generative AI.

·             More projects would be executed such as the creation of a new waste system, a Town Hall booking system and a burial system which would help to improve the service received by customers.

·             The feedback from the Corporate Peer Review was positive, however they would look to improve on digital inclusion, staff engagement, and capitalisation on digital skills across the Council as per paragraph 4.4 of the review.

·             It was recognised that residents who were not able to use digital services would have the necessary offline services made available to them. 

 

The Customer and Digital Services Manager and the Customer and Digital Project Manager provided an update and advised of the following:

 

·             When the Covid Pandemic took place, the Council had to change the way it carried out its work practices and customer interactions, but this had presented an opportunity for them to embark on a new digital transformation programme.

·             To address several ongoing challenges such as the uncertainty of funding, advancements in AI and the increased demand from the Local Plan, a Digital Services Team was built from existing budgets.

·             Various digital platforms were explored to replace the expiring CRM system. After market research had taken place, Netcall was chosen as a low code solution going forward.

·             It had helped to deploy applications to automate tasks, optimise business operations and deliver improved experiences.

·             A comprehensive Digital Strategy was produced to better meet the needs of those that the Council served. This document was a commitment to continuous improvement and innovation in service delivery.

·             Digital Transformation was an enabler and would allow the Council to tackle its workforce challenges and allow it to deliver both its current and future ambitions.

·             The Council was aiming to build a robust digital infrastructure to strengthen service delivery and meet the needs of residents. 

·             Goals and objectives that the Council had were efficient working, gaining customer insight, reduction in current and future costs, faster development and innovation, more agility and faster response to feedback, and collaboration with other councils.

·             There were three main areas of focus for the Digital Transformation Strategy, people, processes and technology.

·             The success of the digital transformation depended on the participation of people and constant training, inclusion and collaboration with staff had helped to ensure this.

·             Regularly monitoring digital initiatives had allowed the Council to deliver value to residents and staff, keeping them at the core of their work.

·             The metrics that had been used to define the success of the programme were summarised as cost and efficiency.

·             Projects that had already been completed or soon to be complete using the digital platform included advancing e-forms on the CRM, creation of the MyCouncillor account, an out-of-hours application for Careline, a Grants database and a portal for the Garden Waste Project. 

·             Economic and non-cashable savings would be made in the long-term in line with contract end dates.

·             The Digital Strategy was put together in 2024, and since its inception, the Customer and Digital Team had tried to be informative about the digital transformation without using technical jargon.

·             The mid-term review of the Digital Strategy would encompass signposting to other authorities across the County that were doing work on digital inclusion.

·             The vision and guiding principles in the strategy were used to consider new projects for the transformation programme.

·             These guiding principles were listed as being digital for customers, making technology work better for staff, making processes as simple and efficient as possible, having an agile and iterative approach, organisational culture and capacity, being data-led in decision-making, continuous development of the services and technology, and making a positive impact to their climate commitment.

·             As part of the development of the digital strategy, a wide range of stakeholders were consulted.

·             The East of England Local Government Association were consulted and conducted a digital maturity assessment.

·             Shared Internal Audit Service reviewed the digital strategy and benchmarked it against the digital strategies of other councils across the country.

·             Sessions were held with the senior management group which showed that better integration, eliminating human error and data sharing between services were all common desires of Council departments. 

·             The feedback received from the Corporate Peer Review on capacity to deliver had been positive. 

·             Ofsted excellent training provider, Multiverse had gone into partnership with the Council to offer digitally focused apprenticeships across the Council. Nineteen staff members joined the first cohort, and their apprenticeships would be centred around AI for business value, transformation and data insights.

·             Once the apprenticeships had progressed, the skills gained by staff members would be capitalised upon and would add value to the Council.

·             Microsoft Co-Pilot was being trialled in a phased approach by a small group of users to focus on how the Council could best use the technology.

·             It was expected that Co-Pilot would improve staff wellbeing, service delivery and staff confidence with technology.

 

The following Members asked questions:

 

·             Councillor Martin Prescott

·             Councillor Donna Wright

·             Councillor Claire Winchester

·             Councillor Ralph Muncer

·             Councillor Matt Barnes

·             Councillor Jon Claydon

·             Councillor Laura Williams

·             Councillor Louise Peace

·             Councillor Jon Clayden

 

In response to questions, Councillor Ian Albert advised that:

 

·             The government gave advice on Digital services, but did not dictate the direction that councils took on it. However, it would be a welcome development to have a central organisation in which councils could work together to achieve their digital goals and make time and cost savings in the process.

·             Applications had been improved based on staff comments from surveys that had been circulated.

·             Savings made from the integration of new applications were hard to track as they were not cost related, they were more focused on enabling officers to perform their jobs better or in the case of the Hitchin Town Hall booking system, making it easier for residents to access council services.

·             Safety and security was a priority and a Corporate Cyber Board with Members and key officers had been established for issues on cyber security within digital transformation to be discussed.

 

In response to questions, the Service Director – Customers advised that:

 

·             Netcall had a large community of users who collaborated and shared information regularly about the platform, which would help the Council with their application building.

·             A graduate was working on their AI pilot and a Data Strategy was in the early stages of development. 

·             The partnership with Multiverse was helping to upskill staff on data collection, allowing the Council to make better business decisions.

·             The first application built using Netcall was the CRM programme and using the low code system allowed them to launch it in a short period of time. 

·             The Digital Transformation Programme was on the list of Council Corporate Projects and on the Council Delivery Plan, therefore it was being reported on regularly at staff briefings, senior management groups, and at an oversight group that met to provide support and direction on the project.

·             Improvements could be made on staff engagement, however there were forums in which staff could engage, and updates on the programme were given in both the internal staff hub and monthly magazine. As a result, staff were regularly approaching the Digital Team to provide feedback on applications.

·             Longer-term savings would be measured at contract end dates when there would be cost avoidance as the Council would be able to build their own applications rather than renew a contract with an external provider, but they were too early into the programme to measure the savings.

·             Opportunities to track productivity were limited, but these would develop over time as the programme progressed.

·             All technology that was considered by the Council went through procurement and IT assessments before being introduced.

·             Technology was ever changing, and a mid-term review of the Digital Strategy would be carried out to address any issues since its inception.

 

In response to questions, the Customer and Digital Services Manager advised that:

 

·             It was recognised that the Digital Strategy was focussed internally, but as part of the mid-term review, they would develop a communications plan to circulate information about digital services to residents and customers.

·             Residents accessed Council services offline by coming to the Council office reception where they could use self-service computers with the help of customer service staff. They did not currently have a system in place to monitor customers that only used offline services, but they were open to suggestions from Members.

·             Several of the aims and ambitions were ongoing rather than complete, but a point raised to have an end date for all goals was noted. 

·             Microsoft Co-Pilot would have many uses such as generating job profiles, creating emails, prioritising email inboxes and transcribing meetings, but it would take time to find the right prompting for these.

·             The chatbot that had already been implemented was a navigation tool but the new version of this would be powered by AI and provide answers to customers with live chat additionally linked. This would extend to the telephony channel that would provide answers to frequently answered questions with more complex enquiries being directed to the customer service centre.

 

In response to questions, the Customer and Digital Project Manager advised that:

 

·             The Digital Team received continued input from all service areas across the council regarding newly built applications. The problems raised and improvements that had been suggested by staff meant that they were more invested in the outcomes and because of this, the relationship between the Digital Team and other service areas had strengthened.

·             Microsoft Copilot would cut time on administration due to its ability to summarise long documents and assist with emails.

·             Copilot adhered to the governance of existing Microsoft programmes used within the Council.

·             Built applications aligned to the accessibility standards for diverse language and literacy needs.

·             Cloud based systems were being looked at on a case-by-case basis, but they would only be implemented if it made financial sense to do so.

 

The Chair thanked Councillor Ian Albert, the Customer and Digital Service Manager, Customer and Digital Project Manager and Service Director – Customers for their presentation and responses to questions.