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Councils Online – the vision becomes a reality

With the successful ‘go live’ of Councils Online in March 2004, the vision of a new business solution for Local Government operations is being realised. Councils Online is Capgemini’s collaborative response to the challenge of creating a business transformation program that incorporates a leading edge IT solution for a syndicate of five New South Wales Councils. It features redesigned business processes across a spectrum of council business functions, a shared and highly adaptable technology platform and an approach to systematically manage the adoption of the associated changes.

The Councils Online program is an end to end business solution that provides the following:

• an integrated suite of software applications, proven in Local Government
• delivery of technology management services from a central, shared facility
• an extensive hardware infrastructure that leverages the Internet
• flexibility and ease of access to software for all end users
• a comprehensive change management framework.

Benefits of Councils Online

The Councils Online vision is to enable efficient and effective interactions with all constituents and provide benefits such as:

• Improved responsiveness – by removing internal department barriers, Councils Online significantly improves councils’ ability to respond quickly and comprehensively to constituent needs.
• Connecting with the public – encompassed in the Councils Online solution is the capability for councils to offer services to constituents and transact with suppliers and employees via the Internet, enabling true 24 hour service operation.
• Lower lifetime cost of ownership – the Councils Online solution is built using the Adaptive Architecture construct. This innovative approach provides councils with a solution designed to adapt to change, reducing the cost of maintaining, evolving and replacing the technology components.
• Flexible resource allocation – by redefining the roles of service and support around a Managed Service Provider (MSP) model, the allocation of resources and accountability for services can be tailored to meet requirements as they change over time.
• Effective use of capital – Councils Online offers a range of funding options to meet councils’ specific financial constraints. In addition, through the collaborative approach and the procurement of the solution components through the MSP, councils benefit from improved purchasing power.
• Reduce risk – through collaboration in the design, build and ongoing operation of the solution, councils benefit from the collective experience and capability of all parties involved.

Councils Online is defining how councils will interact with their constituents in the future, and is seeking new councils to join the syndicate.

Lake Macquarie City Council pilot

On 15 March 2004, Lake Macquarie went live with Phase 1 of Councils Online – the first part of a two phase approach to implementing this revolutionary system. The systems delivered in Phase 1 replaced the core applications in Council’s legacy system as well as adding new core functionality.

The scope of Phase 1 included rating, property, licensing, development, finance, supply, asset management, human resources, payroll, customer relationship management and electronic document management. Phase 2 will introduce additional functionality for HR, finance, library, bookings and facilities, and deliver state of the art management reporting and Internet enabled transactions.

Councils Online is a program that generates enormous organisational change and with that great opportunities. Phase 2 of the program will generate even greater change within the organisation. To undertake such a massive change program across five separate councils is challenging, especially with the goal of producing a single solution for five councils whose business processes were historically quite different.

While the solution involves many software partners, the contract is through Capgemini as the managed service provider. With their robust processes, experienced staff and collaborative approach, Capgemini have proven to be an ideal business partner. In particular, they are people you can trust and people you can work closely with.

As the pilot, Lake Macquarie faced a daunting task of replacing almost every existing system in one process.

As the fourth largest council in NSW by population, there was a huge data conversion exercise, a training program that covered thousands of hours training delivered to one thousand staff and a change management program that penetrated the organisation at all levels. After more than 12 months of design, build and testing of the integrated solution the pilot went live on the planned date and to the project budget.

This achievement is a great tribute to the commitment by all the councils, Capgemini and their partners in the Councils Online solution. The professionalism of Capgemini and the project team meant that issues identified in the pilot were resolved quickly and the solution improved in preparation for the other council’s implementation. The quality of the solution and the approach to the pilot is now reflecting in the smooth implementation of the solution across the other four councils.

Generational change is occurring at Lake Macquarie and it will escalate as we implement the components of Phase 2 in coming months.

Ron Posselt, Project Manager and Group Manager Operations, Lake Macquarie City Council

To discuss how Councils Online would benefit your Council operations, contact Andrew Johnstone-Burt, Jan Richards or Darren O’Shannassy at Capgemini on (02) 9293 4000.

* Copy supplied by Capgemini

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