Digital, Technology & Innovation Strategy

What does our motto "fresh start, bright future" really mean?

Twenty years ago, you would have been hard pressed to find “climate change”, “mental health” or “broadband roll-out” among any council’s priorities. Back in 2002, less than half of UK households had an internet connection; social media and smartphones did not exist; and Netflix’s main business was mailing DVDs to people’s homes. During this time, the digital revolution has changed technology from being a novelty to being an integral part of how we work, communicate and even how we think about the world. In the last twenty years, technology has fundamentally changed our expectations of what is possible.

So when we think about a bright future for West Northamptonshire, we’re forced to ask: what will the world look like in five years, let alone twenty? What will the council’s priorities be, and how will we use the fresh start of a new council to meet them whilst still meeting all of today’s commitments? Our Digital, Technology & Innovation Strategy is our answer to that question: how we achieve more, deliver for less, and do so at an ever-faster rate.

Making our services digital means enabling people to use intuitive services that are easy to use, available any time, and using automation so that staff can spend more time helping residents with the really complex problems. How do we remove barriers for people to engage with us? How do we make our services available out of business hours, reduce the filling out of complex forms, and make key information available at the swipe of a phone or a question to smart speaker? Above all, we know that time is critical when accessing council services: quicker housing applications, quicker social care interventions, quicker repairs to infrastructure all impact people’s lives. Critical to building a bright council of the future is how we use technology to speed up our processes: from weeks to days, days to hours, hours to minutes.

We intend to use our fresh start to push the boundaries of innovation in West Northamptonshire. In recent years, our area has seen the rollout of superfast broadband, trials of e-scooters and the use of robots to deliver groceries to residents. Our strategy sets out our plan to build an Innovation Hub to bring together businesses, academics, residents and others to build on this work and make Northamptonshire a trailblazer in testing new technology. To meet that bright future, we know that we must not only meet the challenges of today, but continually innovate and back developments that ensure we keep pace with an evolving world.

Finally, we must get the basics of our technology right. Whether equipping our staff with the right tools, unifying our inherited systems, or building robust cyber security defences to protect our data and services, we can only succeed in our journey if we build solid foundations first.

The creation of our new council is an opportunity for a fresh approach and a fresh start for West Northamptonshire. We see technology as the engine that helps power forward our services to meet our residents’ needs and build that bright future, and this strategy lays out our plan to do just that.

Anna Earnshaw
Chief Executive

Councillor Mike Hallam
Cabinet Member Human Resources
and Corporate Services

Where we are today

We are a newly formed local authority that is ambitious for Northamptonshire, its residents and businesses, and for what we can achieve as a council to support that. We inherited the technology, systems and practices of four predecessor councils. There are elements of best practice here, but substantial areas that require significant modernisation and investment to meet both the needs of today and the evolving needs the council is likely to have to meet in the future. Whilst we must improve our internal technology basics, we must move upwards and outwards: putting a greater focus on using technology to redesign council services, and making innovation a key focus of our efforts.

What we’re going to do

We intend to get closer to our customers, whether internal or external: collaborating and co-designing services, harnessing both internal expertise as well as partnering with communities, experts, volunteers, academics and businesses to better use technology to improve what we do. We will focus on need and outcomes above all. Ultimately we intend to make West Northamptonshire a smart, digitally inclusive placed served by a council that uses technology to deliver efficient, effective services.

Our Technology in numbers

We employ 192 people in technology. Of those:

• 54 support shared technologies in use across West Northants, North Northants, Milton Keynes and Cambridgeshire County councils.

The equivalent of:

• 34 support services for North Northants, inherited from the former county council
• 22 support services for the Northamptonshire Children’s Trust
• 72 directly support West Northamptonshire Council’s needs and those of the organisations we support (including Northamptonshire Partnership Homes and the Northampton Leisure Trust)

The average service length of our staff is 12 years, 7 months. Our longest serving staff member will celebrate 40 years with us in 2022. 15 staff members have joined the council since WNC was created.

Last year, our support teams handled 79,943 support tickets from over 116 locations. In an average month, our online security is tested 12,500 times.

We support:

• 650+ databases
• > 2,000,000 GB of data
• >800 systems
• 2,000 invoices across over 500 contracts for services that we buy from 274 suppliers.
• Internet access for over 130 sites, with a bandwidth of over 46,000 Mbps
• Over 15,000 physical network access points and 393 wireless access points

Our six priorities

Clean and green

Environment and Wellbeing

• Carbon neutral by 2030
• Climate summit in first few months
• Increased wildlife species and more trees
• Increased electric charging and energy efficiency
• Vibrant towns and villages
• High quality parks
• Accessible green space for all

Improved Life Chances

Health, Social Care and Families

• Healthy, safe and protected Children
• Increased aspirations in young people
• Investment in new schools and provision
• Adults supported to live independently
• Care provided for those that need it
• Reduced hospital stays and delays
• Joined up and local services with health
• Safe and secure accommodation for all

Connected Communities

Transport and Connectivity

• Improved road, rail and bus networks
• Completion of major roads projects
• Improved road quality
• Increased use of electric vehicles and charging points
• Enhanced broadband and mobile connectivity

Thriving Villages and Towns

Place shaping and Homes

• Regeneration of our core town centres
• Safer communities with less anti social behaviour
• Flourishing and supported small business
• Sustainable planning for growth
• Increased affordable housing and Council homes
• Raised standards of privately rented homes

Economic Development

Growth and Prosperity

• Published west strategic infrastructure plan
• Framework for long term economic growth
• Increased inward investment
• Building on our rich heritage
• Increased visitors to our attractions
• Infrastructure benefits and investment through our role in regional forums and plans

Robust Resource Management

Transparency and financial probity

• Council tax rises capped at £99 a year
• Stable finances and rainy day reserves
• Robust scrutiny of spending
• Open and transparent decision making
• Financial prudence underpinning long term decisions and plans
• Optimised debt management

West Northamptonshire is a leader among councils in the use of technology, digital and innovation: harnessing imaginative ideas and new developments to deliver transformed public services that give both customers and staff the support, tools and information they need to thrive.

Our extended vision

We continually tailor services to meet individual needs, using data and experience to rapidly refine and redesign our offer, and constantly improve the speed and efficiency of our delivery. We co-produce and co-design our services in partnership with the people we serve, using our collective wisdom to make West Northamptonshire a digitally inclusive place in which council services can be accessed easily and conveniently by all.

Our mission to empower the Council and its customers

Our digital, technology and innovation strategy will be the engine which empowers the council and its customers to achieve more, for less, ever more quickly, fulfilling our vision in keeping with our six corporate priorities.

Achieving more means that we can leverage technology to support ever more customers and requests, offering new services as needed; so that customers can access all of the services and information they need from any location, at any time.

Doing this for less means that by harnessing technology, the cost and effort of delivering our services should fall on a like-for-like basis, making the council more and more productive and freeing up resources for use elsewhere.

Ever more quickly means that we will continue to find ways of speeding up internal delivery, getting the right answers and support to our customers as close to the point of need as possible.

Strategic goals

To fulfil our mission to be that engine of delivery and realise our vision for West Northamptonshire as a national leader in the use of technology as a council, we’ve set five strategic goals that our strategy must meet. These show the values we must embody in how we achieve our mission. Every initiative in our strategy must support at least one of these goals as well as at least one of our overall corporate priorities (numbered 1 to 6, reflecting the council’s overriding goals), and you will see these referenced throughout this page.

Our key themes: breaking down the plan

Transforming an organisation the size of West Northamptonshire Council with technology is no small task: it will involve dozens of activities and hundreds of projects that collectively ensure we meet our strategic goals and thus our vision for the council. To make sense of this, we’ve broken plans down into three key themes: Technology, Digital and Innovation.

Technology: building strong foundations

In the context of our strategy, the Technology theme is about creating solid foundations on which we can build digital services and a council fit for the future. It describes the necessary components, infrastructure and practices that allow us to work efficiently and securely, and which give us the flexibility to meet future needs more quickly as they arise. Our key initiatives are:

• Provide the right tools for the right job
• Modernise our infrastructure
• Consolidate our systems
• Fortify our cyber security defences

Digital: transforming and creating services that empower people

The Digital theme is all about rethinking service provision, using a simple question: if we were designing this service from scratch with today’s tools and technologies, what would it look like? Essential to this theme is understanding people as much as the technology landscape. It covers how we interact with customers, how we co-design services with them, and how we design in as much control and flexibility to suit their needs as we can. Our key initiatives are:

• Design services first and foremost for customers
• Build digital services
• Increase digital literacy
• Reduce paper by 50%
• Deliver an integrated care system

Innovation: designing for the future of West Northamptonshire

Our Innovation theme is about scanning the horizon for new ideas and opportunities that prepare both the council and the area for what it might need in the future. Given the time it takes to find, test, and embed new ideas – how can we start that process now so that we stay up-to-date? How do we find new technologies that genuinely benefit the council? And most importantly – how do we partner with other local advocates as a community, to drive innovative ideas that don’t just improve council services, but directly benefit the residents of West Northamptonshire? Our key initiatives are:

• Become a data-driven organisation
• Create an innovation hub
• Invest in Smart City technology

1. Provide the right tools for the right job

Our staff are the backbone of our services. If we’re going to deliver better digital services that fulfil our vision, we need to equip them with tools that are well-designed customised to their needs, and support them to be productive and engaged.

We will:

Fully refresh all staff computing devices across West Northamptonshire, ensuring that all of our staff have fast modern computers that allow them to work from anywhere. We’ll gather data and user insight to tailor the equipment to best serve each individual and each role, maximising personal productivity. We’ll also make sure that our offices contain supporting equipment (screens, cameras, etc) that work with any computer.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A and B

Make sure that all our key business systems are securely accessible to staff, no matter where they are working from. Hybrid working is here to stay, and we must ensure that staff can contribute fully and equally no matter their current location.

Fulfils
Priority: Green and Clean
Strategic goals A, B and D

Replace our telephony, network and contact centre systems with a modern cloud-hosted systems that allow our staff to work from anywhere, and facilitate them working across geographies as virtual teams. We will ensure that our communications tools – whether web, phone or mobile – seamlessly interact, and that we harness the best of modern customer management tools (AI, bots, intelligent routing) to help solve customer queries at the earliest point.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A and B

Introduce fully provisioned technology services for guests at all of our office locations. We often work with partners to deliver our services and every visitor will have seamless access to secure guest wi-fi, conferencing facilities and other services to support their work.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A, B and D

Modernise our on-premise meeting rooms to ensure that council staff and visitors alike can quickly and easily connect to meetings, presentation tools and AV equipment without needing additional support. The experience of staff in virtual calls should be smooth and identical regardless of whether they attend from our offices or other locations.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A, B, C and D

For customers, this means

• Staff will be able to serve your needs quicker, as they’ll have access to fast equipment to retrieve information.
• Your call waiting time will reduce in peak times, as we’ll have more staff available to answer calls when as our phone systems become interchangeable.
• You’ll get access to a wider array of self support tools on our website that help you get the answers you need quicker.

For staff, this means

• You’ll have faster computers that are easier to use, portable, and allow you to plug into any office desk or work remotely.
• You’ll benefit from simpler, easy-to-use meeting room equipment.
• Our systems will be available to you irrespective of location.
• Visitors can work easily in our offices, speeding up their collaboration with you.

2. Modernise our infrastructure

A building is only as good as its foundations. To build digital council services that deliver on our vision, the underlying infrastructure must be flexible, scalable, secure and easily deployable to meet the challenge. We must set the right design principles to ensure that every piece of infrastructure supports these aims.

We will

Pursue a Cloud First agenda, in line with UK Government best practice since 2013 , ensuring that we can provision computer capabilities automatically and on demand for new services or increased traffic. We will conduct a strategic review of our entire technology estate to consolidate our hardware, remove waste/ duplication and take full advantage of the benefits of Cloud technologies wherever appropriate and possible.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B and C

Help to meet our Net Zero commitments by 2030 by measuring the carbon footprint of our infrastructure and actively reducing and offsetting it via our procurement choices.

Fulfils
Priority: Green and clean
Strategic goals: B and E

Prioritise software-as-a-service (SaaS) solutions in our system choices, reducing the administrative burden of maintaining our systems. We will set clear principles that prioritise buy-over-build in our software choices, and review the total cost of ownership (TCO) to factor in administrative overheads in staff time that can be better spent elsewhere, when there is no clear need to manage the hardware on which systems sit.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B and C

Embrace microservices and serverless architecture to allow us to build small, efficient and flexible applications that solve business problems in a future-proofed and maintainable way, where off-the-shelf software does not fully deliver on our needs. This approach will also help us integrate systems together, and by owning the integration tier ourselves, we will be able to drive higher business value.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B, C, D and E

For customers, this means

• You can be confident that we are spending your money wisely: ensuring that we make cost-effective choices in our hardware and software; and spending less and effort on the basics.
• Technology will help meet our Net Zero obligations.
• Over time, you’ll get a more joined-up service (so less repeating information or forms).

For staff this means

• You’ll use newer software that stays up to date when we replace systems.
• We’ll be able to create tools that solve smaller problems, and don’t need lengthy procurements
• Over time, we’ll see a more joined up view of the customer: how our full relationship looks with them, rather than segmented by service/system.

3. Consolidate our systems

As a new authority, we have inherited the combined systems of four previous authorities. We must consolidate our overall systems estate: ensuring that staff work as united WNC teams, reducing the overhead of managing multiple processes and making sure that customers are treated equally, no matter what part of West Northamptonshire they hail from.

We will

Establish an architecture function that creates a full blueprint for our systems, ensuring that new projects adhere to good principles and that systems and projects are commissioned into a planned future vision. We will set clear principles that all new systems must adhere to, which ensure that they are compatible with each other and our overall vision.

Fulfils
Priority: ;Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A and B

Reduce our existing 800 systems by 30% over the next three years to reduce complexity, duplication and wasted time and effort faced by staff. We can increase the council’s efficiency and reduce costs, contract and supplier management, and procurement activity by ensuring that different council areas with similar needs reuse the same systems, rather than separate ones.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B and C

Begin a programme to integrate key systems, ensuring they exchange data and allow us to progressively build up a single view of the customer; reducing staff management time and the numbers of logins or re-entry of data customers and staff must deal with. We will aim for a “tell us once” set of systems that do not re-quiz customers for the same data repeatedly

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B and C

Implement a single-sign-on (SSO) system that ensures all new applications and compatible existing systems only ever require one set of login details.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A, B, C and D

Build a complete application portfolio that holds data on all our systems, allowing us to manage their lifecycle and ensure they remain up-to-date and fit for purpose.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B and C

For customers this means

• You’ll get asked less over time to submit your information again and again by different council services.
• Customer service agents and other council staff will be able to see your full relationship with the authority where appropriate, helping them to tailor answer to more complex needs.
• You can be assured that the council is reducing its administrative overhead to maximise its spend on service provision.

For staff this means

• Over time, you’ll need fewer login details – eventually, just one set to gain access to all council systems.
• You’ll interact with fewer systems to achieve the same job; where there are multiple, we’ll be increasing their ability to talk to each other and share data, saving you time.
• There’ll be clear published guidelines for commissioning new systems, to ensure that we successfully implement robust software that is well-tailored to our needs.
• We’ll better police our systems to ensure they don’t fall out-of-date and we have time to consider changes ahead of renewals.

4. Fortify our cyber security defences

Against a landscape of ever-increasing cyber threats to infrastructure, services and personal data, we will ensure that our protections are continually enhanced and that we maintain vigilance as guardians of public information and deliverers of vital services.

We will

Attain CyberEssentials+ and ISO27001 certification to bolster our security credentials and rigorously test our defences. It is right that we benchmark our capabilities against rigorous standards.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B

Implement multi-factor authentication is required in all newly commissioned systems, and update compatible existing systems to require it. A single password should never be enough information to access confidential data.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B

Conduct rigorous audits and tests, including a full disaster recovery rehearsal every year to ensure we can restore council services quickly in the event of their failure, and thorough penetration testing to probe our own defences for weaknesses we can address.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B

Conduct a strategic review of our cyber security readiness, growing our team’s capabilities to meet the challenges and commissioning new services and tools to meet the outcome of our findings.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B

Invest in XDR technology to automatically shut down attacks-in-progress, moving beyond detection and manual response to a state where we can stop attackers in real-time.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B and E

Commit to ensuring, where within our control, that all servers and computers are patched within 14 days of a security update being released.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B

Regularly train our staff using creative tools and techniques that go beyond annual reading or basic learning, and instead embed good security habits. In any system, people can be either the weakest link or the greatest defence, so we will ensure that West Northamptonshire leads in good practice rather than being a cautionary tale.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A, D and E

For customers, this means

• You can be reassured that we are incorporating leading industry practices to secure your confidential information, and that we are resilient against cyber attacks that aim to disrupt or stop the provision or key services.

For staff, this means

• You can expect to be trained to a good standard of practice in cyber awareness and skills, and feel prepared to spot and respond to attempts to compromise our data and services.
• You can be confident that a compromised password will not be enough to allow someone to abuse your access privileges.

5. Design services first and foremost for customers

Digital tools and systems are only effective when they are rigorously designed and tested against actual customer needs, and in partnership with customers wherever possible. We will adopt standards and practices that ensure the council builds and provides services that work for the people using them.

We will

Set self-service as a principle in all our systems: that is, that users should be able to achieve their goals when interacting with us, without requiring training or needing direct assistance from another person, wherever possible. We will continually rethink our services to look for ways to make this possible.

Fulfils 
Priority: Green and clean 
Strategic goals: A, B, C and D

Build a User Experience (UX) function which tests all our system designs against real customer needs and experiences, and designs improved versions. By immersing ourselves in context and then designing and testing prototypes and user interface with customers, we can determine where the real problems are and continually improve our systems. This will uplift the quality of the digital experiences we provide both staff and customers, regardless of ability or confidence in using tech.

Fulfils 
Priority: Green and clean 
Strategic goals: A, D and E

Implement multiple channels for customer engagement so that people can connect with us in the way they choose, whether this be the web, SMS, WhatsApp, WNC applications or a traditional telephone call. We will use tools that are already a part of people’s daily lives, to create a flexible and seamless user experience.

Fulfils 
Priority: Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, D and E

Follow the Government Digital Service (GDS) Design Principles and Service Manual, making sure we implement best practice standards to design and build digital services for user need.

Fulfils 
Priority: Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, B and D

Uphold our commitment to the Local Digital Declaration, a UK government-led initiative that commits councils to using the best of digital tools and practices.

Fulfils 
Priority: Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, B and D

For customers, this means

• You should be able to achieve most of your goals online and without intervention at a time and place to suit you, but we’ll always make staff available if you need or prefer to speak to somebody.
• We’ll increasingly interact with you where you want to: on social media, via WhatsApp but also via more traditional methods.
• We will keep investing in system designs to make them ever-simpler to use, using real-world experiences of our customers to guide their development.

For staff, this means

• Internally, you can expect the same commitment to improving system designs as our customers can: we will use research, your own experiences and feedback and digital methods to simplify the tools you use, and help you get more done easier and quicker.

6. Build digital services

We intend to make our services maximally available over digital: that is, that customers should be able to access as many council services online as possible, at any time and from any location, and without staff intervention wherever possible. As part of this, we’ll adopt principles that allow us to build new services and features faster and more reliably.

We will

Build a unified customer portal on our website, giving personalised access to customer data, tools, documents and information and allowing users to manage their council services.

Fulfils 
Priority: Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A and D

Create a public digital services roadmap which sets out our plans for making more and more council services available digitally over time. We will work service-by-service to expand the range of interactions, choices and information customer can access, and publish our timelines for implementing these.

Fulfils 
Priority: Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A and D

Create a West Northamptonshire app, giving customers the ability to get key information, access council services and receive notifications directly from their mobile phone without having to visit a website.

Fulfils 
Priority: Economic Development and Improved Life Chances 
Strategic goals: A, B, C and D

Invest in low code tools so we can give nontechnical staff the ability to help build new services. Giving our individual service areas the power to do more of their own system creation frees up technical capacity to accelerate our digital programme.

Fulfils 
Priority: Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, B, C, D and E

Move our main websites to an editorial model, whereby we grant individual services the power to expand and update their own information on the website. Ensuring all areas can submit their content directly speeds up the time to get it content online, making us a quality control check and not gatekeepers.

Fulfils 
Priority: Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, B, C and D

We will embrace prototyping and fast failure. This means testing concepts, prototypes and pilots in rapid time (2-4 weeks), allowing us to make sure we ‘fail fast’, continuously learn and course correct to build better solutions, saving valuable time and money by solving the right problem for the user instead of committing to lengthy projects that don’t deliver in practice what they did in theory

Fulfils 
Priority: Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, B and C

Adopt a code re-use strategy, meaning that we first adopt services build and tested successfully rather than create our own, where possible. Where we do build our own, we will be strategic and look to make reusable components (i.e. applications, transactions, bookings that can be used across more than one service.

Fulfils 
Priority: Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: B and C

For customers, this means

• You’ll be able to access more and more services online with a single login: submit applications, track progress, arrange services and other help.
• We’ll have a single app that you can use to access our services natively on your smartphone.
• You can see what’s coming next in our plans, and know when to expect new features.

For staff, this means

• You’ll see fewer requests for routine help as our website handles more of these.
• You’ll have greater control over the information on your service held on our public websites.
• You’ll get abilities over time to amend or create simple online customer tools, reducing the need to ask our DTI teams to build or change them.

7. Increase digital literacy

We want our systems and tools to benefit all staff and customers, no matter where they are or what their experience, ability and confidence levels are. Beyond this, we want to raise the bar for digital literacy in the council and our communities, so that people have further skills, opportunities and autonomy in an increasingly digital world.

We will

Establish an internal technology training function to bridge the learning gap with existing systems and tools internal training, upskilling staff with the skills they need to operate the public services of both today and the future.

Fulfils 
Priority: Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A and D

Create a technology change champions network within the council to spread good practice and empower staff in different services to learn directly from peers, and provide opportunities to involve our staff directly in digital rollouts.

Fulfils 
Priority: Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A and D

Implement digital onboarding tools for new tools and systems, supporting good practice and helping new users adopt tools more easily by walking them through key changes and features.

Fulfils 
Priority: Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A and D

Create a Northamptonshire equivalent to the UK’s Digital Skills Partnerships programme, bringing together public, private and charity sector organisations to increase the digital capability of individuals and organisations in the county.

Fulfils 
Priority: Economic Development 
Strategic goals: A and E

Launch a formal technology apprentice programme, offering opportunities to both staff and residents to work within our technology service and develop technology career options and valuable skillsets.

Fulfils 
Priority: Improved Life Chances and Economic Development 
Strategic goals: A

Develop digital literacy programmes in partnership with the community: working with community groups, businesses and the public to put on digital events, workshops, and online content; providing thought leadership, collaboration, support and transparency in the digital space.

Fulfils 
Priority: Improved Life Chances and Economic Development 
Strategic goals: A

For customers, this means

• You’ll see initiatives within Northamptonshire that offer you the opportunity to improve your digital skills and literacy, applicable to your work and personal life.
• You’ll have the opportunity to work in partnership with the council and other groups to directly shape digital programmes that benefit the community.
• Local residents will see more apprenticeship opportunities with the council in technology work.
• New council systems will be easier to use and feature in-built training to help you get started.

For staff, this means

• Formal training courses and opportunities to help support your use of systems and tools will be available.
• New council systems will be easier to use and feature in-built training to help you get started.
• You’ll get opportunities to advance your own skills and lead technology change in your area by becoming a change champion.

8. Reduce paper by 50%

Reliance on paper forms slows down service delivery, breaks the principle of being able to access services “anywhere, at any time” and impacts our Net Zero by 2030 pledge. We will drive a “go paperless” strategy and use technology to create a more flexible, carbon-friendly service that cuts down the time and effort required to deliver vital services to the public.

We will

Reduce the number of paper forms required by our services by 50% overall, identifying quicker and more intuitive digital ways of capturing customer information and re-using previously submitted data.

Fulfils 
Priority: Green and Clean and Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, B, C and D

Create a “Tell Us Once” programme to identify and reduce the number of times customers need to submit their details and information to us, and re-use this wherever it is safe and legal to do so.

Fulfils 
Priority: Green and Clean and Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, B, C and D

Introduce e-signatures as standard for both internal governance and administration, and when dealing with customers: remove the need for physical signed paperwork wherever and whenever it is safe and legal to do so, and so speed up our processes.

Fulfils 
Priority: Green and Clean and Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, B, C, D and E

Introduce tools to replace Word documents, Excel spreadsheets, non-interactive PDFs and other “pseudo-paper” with truly interactive forms and systems that make exchanging data easy and secure, and empowering our council staff to create their own new processes and data capture points in a truly digital way without needing to resort to manual forms. We will further ensure that content is held in a reusable digital format where possible, steering away from PDFs and other less accessible formats where possible

Fulfils 
Priority: Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, B, C and D

Implement digital identity check solutions as standard such as photo recognition software to check identity, dramatically reducing the amount of scanning, printing, postage and receipts for supporting documentation.

Fulfils 
Priority: Green and Clean and Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, B, C, D and E

Create a single electronic document management system (EDMS) across the council, ensuring our internal documentation is well-organised, secured, backed up and available to staff from all work locations

Fulfils 
Priority: Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, B and C

For customers, this means

• You’ll increasingly be able to get information and applications straight to us digitally, rather than having to print, scan and post forms if you prefer.
• You’ll get asked less and less over time to resubmit information you’ve already shared with us.
• Content on our website will be easier to search and find on the whole.
• The overall time taken from the moment you apply for services to when they are delivered will reduce.

For staff, this means

• You’ll have most customer data in a single place digitally, with less manually scanning or copying to transfer paper or emails into systems.
• It will be quicker and easier for you to sign and fill out needed forms, and to receive input and signatures from other staff members.
• It will be easier for you to find and store key council documentation.

9. Deliver an integrated care system

As a key partner in the creation of the Northamptonshire Integrated Care System, we will work collaboratively with our other local partners in health and local government to realise the vision of delivering joined-up health, social care and other services that improve the lives of people in our area.

We will

Empower our population and workforce with access to digital solutions that are inclusive, high quality, and integrated to revolutionise overall health, wellbeing and care.

Fulfils 
Priority: Improved Life Chances and Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, B, C and D

Provide our workforce and population with the tools to proactively prevent and manage ill health, harnessing shared data sets and user-focussed tools that are shared across the integrated system to deal with health issues at the earliest possible opportunity.

Fulfils 
Priority: Improved Life Chances and Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, B, C, D and E

Use digital tools to create a seamless and collaborative health and care experience for patients, so that patients and their carers can manage the full range of local services and interactions needed to support their health and care needs.

Fulfils 
Priority: Improved Life Chances and Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, C, D and E;

Harness shared data to provide insights into the best ways to improve health and care outcomes, using the benefits of Big Data to uncover new strategies and tactics to improve overall health in the population, and redesign health and care pathways to improve outcomes

Fulfils 
Priority: Improved Life Chances and Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A, B, C and E

Provide our skills, experience and leadership to the ICS, working constructively with partner organisations to pool our resources, knowledge and know-how to ensure that ICS initiatives succeed in their objectives.

Fulfils 
Priority: Improved Life Chances and Robust Resource Management 
Strategic goals: A and D

For customers, this means

• You’ll have easy access to both health and care information from your digital devices, and be able to manage services and update your information as required.
• Community members will utilise remote and virtual services to manage and monitor their health; leveraging digital tools to receive care from the comfort of their home.
• Citizens will access a range of local health and care services through a single point of entry; providing a joined-up experience across health and care settings.

For staff, this means

• Staff will see a holistic view of health and care information irrespective of where they are working; being able to better support care across pathways.
• Staff will be supported by innovative, secure and reliable systems; removing duplication of effort, and enabling cross-organisational working.
• Staff will have access to consolidated and real-time reporting and analytics; tracking care outcomes and determining interventions or preventative measures.

10. Become a data-driven organisation

The advent of Big Data – the collective pooling of disparate information from systems, sensors, observations and other sources – has made it possible to spot trends in seconds, minutes and hours rather than days, weeks and months. This can help the council forecast demand, identify patterns and respond to problems proactively rather than reactively, using these insights to rapidly refine and redesign services to tailor them ever more closely to the needs of our customers.

By gathering this data and using the right tools, we can gain deep insights on-demand, and evolve our services ever more quickly to match needs.

We will

Build a dedicated data function, with a remit to integrate our data sources and develop business intelligence and analytics tools to better support our internal decision-making and offer us insights that we use to continually refine services.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B, C and E

Collaborate with other local authorities to create common local government standards for exchanging data, ensuring we are better able to collaborate with nearby partners to solve local problems collectively.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B, C, D, and E

Crowdsource data from our residents by making it quick and easy to report problems (e.g. potholes, broken streetlights, anti-social behaviour or environmental health issues) using a mobile phone, and so speeding up our information gathering process when addressing public issues.

Fulfils
Priority: Connected Communities and Thriving Villages and Towns
Strategic goals: A, B, C, D, and E

Invest in emerging data technologies such as predictive analytics, machine learning, data-as-a-service tools and Internet of Things (IoT) devices to help drive insights into our services.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: B, C and E

For customers, this means

• We’ll be able to increase the speed at which we re-design services to suit your current needs.
• You’ll be able to report some problems and issues to us quickly, and in a way that gives us instant access to key information on the problem.
• You can be confident that we’re working in partnership with nearby bodies and sharing experience rather than “re-inventing the wheel”.

For staff, this means

• You’ll have a dedicated internal function that can pool data from multiple sources and provide tools to help you make sense of what’s going on for your service.
• You’ll get more useful real-time data from residents and customers on their needs.

11. Create an Innovation Hub

Knowledge and good ideas are never held by one person or organisation: they’re collective. Whether informing our research on the right technologies to implement in the council, or whether looking to advocate for technologies that directly support our residents and local economy (such as 5G and fibre rollout), we will make the most progress when we partner with other local experts and jointly push an innovation agenda.

We will

Create an Innovation Hub that brings together local partners: public services, private businesses, academics, volunteers, residents, neighbouring authorities and others to identify, advocate for and pilot new technologies for the council and its residents and businesses.

Fulfils
Priority: Economic Development and Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A, D and E

Provide direct support to the popular Digital Northants initiative, helping to expand the grassroots-driven event that showcases the best technology talent and ideas in the Northamptonshire area.

Fulfils
Priority: Economic Development and ;Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A, D and E

Bid for technology pilots to happen in Northamptonshire, such as the robot delivery service already operating here or the e-scooters trial. We will work with hub partners to identify appropriate pilots and ensure Northamptonshire is an ideal candidate for trialling new technologies.

Fulfils
Priority: Thriving Villages and Towns, 5, 6
Strategic goals: A, D and E

Create an internal research and development programme to actively identify and trial new technologies, and feed the results into our evolving technology strategy and roadmap of service development and improvement.

Fulfils
Priority: Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: C and E

Create an internal technology advisory service, able to act as an advisor to other council services looking to employ technology in their offerings, and support them in identifying appropriate technology for their needs.

Fulfils
Priority: Thriving Villages and Towns and Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A, C, D and E

Bid for public and private funding to support innovation in the area, to help us realise our vision of a Northamptonshire which is a location of choice for those wanting to invest in and develop new technology.

Fulfils
Priority: Economic Development and Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A, D and E

For customers, this means

• You’ll be able to participate directly in and benefit from initiatives that spur innovation and technology adoption with Northamptonshire.
• We’ll work with partners to make Northamptonshire an attractive place to for businesses and innovators reliant on technology and innovation.

For staff, this means

• You’ll have access to a dedicated internal team who can help advise you on cutting edge technologies, and help you identify those worth backing and incorporating into your service.

12. Invest in Smart City technology

We need to start thinking today of how to build the council of tomorrow. The council of tomorrow will be able to re-route traffic on roads in real time based on sensors tracking congestion, air quality or availability of parking; to detect when bins are full and collect them when they are, rather than at set times; to forecast demand for services and provision phone lines and staff automatically

We will

Pilot predictive analytics systems to help us respond to upcoming problems before they occur: whether it be demand forecasting for our services, identifying vulnerable residents who can benefit from early support and intervention from targeted services or spotting behavioural trends that help us pro-actively re-design our local environment to better support resident needs.

Fulfils
Priority: Green and Clean, Improved Life Chances, Connected Communities, Thriving Villages and Towns, Economic Development and Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A, D and E

Investigate smart routing of traffic and pedestrians to improve congestion and access to parking, better inform highway and town designs, and monitor/control pollution a

Fulfils
Priority: Green and Clean, Connected Communities, Thriving Villages and Towns and Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A, B, C, D and E

Drive universal adoption of smart parking apps, ensuring not only that residents can reap the benefits of cashless and remotely managed parking services, but that appropriate solutions for delivery organisations support both Northamptonshire’s businesses and residents who rely on them.

Fulfils
Priority: Green and Clean, Connected Communities, Thriving Villages and Towns and Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A, B, C, D and E

Explore smart waste collection as a promising initiative to reduce the costs of waste collection and take unnecessary traffic off the roads, reducing congestion and contributing to reducing our carbon footprint.

Fulfils
Priority: Green and Clean, Thriving Villages and Towns and Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A, B, C, D and E

Advise on the implementation of town and vehicle electrification, ensuring that we have the appropriate infrastructure to support council, business and private electric vehicles and their needs as this technology expands.

Fulfils
Priority: Green and Clean, Connected Communities, Economic Development and Robust Resource Management
Strategic goals: A, B, C, D and E

For customers, this means

• Our services will help optimise your journey whilst reducing our climate impact.
• We’ll be able to offer the support of council services at earlier stages when you interact with us, using our collective experience and data to better predict your needs.
• You’ll see more widespread use of smart parking apps that support both resident and business needs.

For staff, this means

• We’ll be able to help reduce the overall cost of service by offering data insights that help you support customer needs earlier, and more closely tailor the services we offer to customer needs in real-time.