Case Study – Singleton Shire Council
Introduction
Any council IS Manager, or for that matter any Director of Corporate Services, will
tell you agendas and minutes are not the sexiest, the most challenging or interesting
aspect of a council's administrative processes. They are more likely to cite financial
management or DA processing. Yet dig a little deeper and you find a recognition
of the critical role played by whichever process brings to councillors' attention
the issues which need to be tackled and the jobs which need to be done, and then
records Council's decisions and instructions.
The processes involved in the writing of departmental reports, the collation of
agendas and the recording and publication of minutes can smooth a council's progress
towards the attainment of its goals. Slow, inefficient, inconsistent and labour
intensive business papers processes can produce any number of errors and general
stuff-ups, not to mention indigestion, ill will and poor communication.
Until its world was turned upside down by the explosion of frenetic coal mining
activity generated by the minerals boom, Singleton Shire Council had got along okay
with its own version of manually processed business papers. The inadequacy of these
processes quickly became all too apparent when Council's workload expanded so rapidly.
Location and Issues
Singleton is located in the centre of the Hunter Valley region of NSW, about 200
km northwest of Sydney and 80 km inland from Newcastle. The town and its council
were caught unawares when the requirement for change was forced upon them.
A medium sized council, employing about 180 people, Singleton Shire Council was
faced with new and demanding issues, including infrastructure challenges, wine grower
and market farmer hostility towards the ever-encroaching mining activities - there
are now 18 coal mines around Singleton - and dramatic new demands on council processes
and procedures, including the management of agendas and minutes, with all the flow-on
effects these can generate.
Before Infocouncil
Business papers. Business papers processing was totally manual, with no consistent
formatting of reports, and with the three responsible secretaries - for the General
Manager, for Corporate Services and for Operational Services - using different methods
each had devised over time. Progress through the meeting cycle was slow and labour
intensive, with reports and subsequently agendas and minutes from the various departmental
meetings being so different they had to be printed on different coloured paper for
ease of identification. The coloured sheets were then brought together by one of
the secretaries for physical collation and photocopying. There was no overall system
controlling or guiding report filing. Neither was there one document for emailing
or posting to the web. It was all rather haphazard and inefficient.
Recognising the need for change. The Manager, Information Systems, Mark Wiblen,
was fortunate to have, in the then new General Manager, someone computer literate
and IT friendly. He was receptive to suggestions that a more efficient and consistent
system was needed, and said, in effect, "We need to be doing this". Heaving
a great sigh of relief, the IS Manager got on with the task of seeking and procuring
a system which would, from a historical viewpoint, be revolutionary.
Why Infosphere? Council considered four proposals for the introduction of
software to manage business papers electronically. One seemed overpriced and another
was also quickly eliminated. The choice came down to Infocouncil versus another
product which was more expensive, but where the additional 'features' seemed to
be overkill, attributes going beyond "what we were aiming at". The IS Manager
had also rung several councils already using Infocouncil and the product had been
given "good wraps". The decision was made to purchase Infocouncil.
After Infocouncil
Reports. Council decided to retain the original structure within which three
secretaries looked after three distinct areas of council activity. That is, there
was to be no overall administrator. The secretaries were happy with the forms developed
by Infocouncil for their specific purposes, and all reports could easily be collated
into one agenda document. With the introduction of standardised structures and formatting,
report writing was greatly streamlined and rationalised.
Agenda. All councillors have been provided with laptops, and the final agenda
is emailed to them one week before the meeting, with Infocouncil also controlling
publication of the agenda to the web. The IS Manager describes the Infocouncil-generated
web publishing facility as "beautiful". Many of the agendas are extremely
large, running to 200 pages and more, and Infocouncil's ability to quickly recompile
the agenda after any required changes, automatically repaginating, has calmed many
an ulcer.
Minutes. Using their own laptops, the secretaries take the minutes live,
so by the end of the meeting they are ready for submission to the relevant authorisers,
and thence for emailing and publication to the web. Directors and managers have
expressed their admiration for the speed and efficiency, the despatch, with which
each step in the process is achieved.
Action sheets. The Action Sheets module has been in use for the past six
months. Administrators email action sheets to report writers and monitor progress.
Managers are kept informed by report. In future releases, this part of the system
will be opened up so that managers can access and review action memos submitted
by their staff.
Integration with the EDMS. The IS Manager says the integration with Trim
is "almost totally seamless, bullet proof".
Conclusion
When asked how easy it is for managers and supervisors to get what they want from
the use of Infocouncil, the IS Manager said "Quite, no, very easy". Because
its use has tidied up the entire business papers process, he gives Infocouncil,
out of 10, "a solid 8 or 9. It's a good system, it works really well." The
rating would be a definite 9, he says, if the customary process of having only one
administrator controlling the total process were to be adopted.
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