OBJECTIVE CASE STUDY
THURROCK COUNCIL
ORGANISATION
Thurrock Council is a unitary Council
Thurrock Council
in Essex, England, providing public
INDUSTRY
Local Authority - Housing Department
BENEFITS AT A GLANCE
»»
50% reduction in administrative staff
and associated cost savings through
the automation of admin-intensive
processes
»»
80% reduction in the volume of paper
held and associated cost savings
»»
»»
TRANSFORMATION IN HOUSING
services to around 158,000 residents of
The Council’s Housing Service was one
the main town of Grays and surrounding
of the first to adopt this ‘invest to save’
areas. Following a housing stock options
approach, and during 2013 embarked on a
appraisal in 2005 the Council opted to
transformation programme which required
retain its social housing stock, and it
the closure of area offices, streamlining of
currently owns and manages around
administrative support, automation of admin-
10,200 rented properties across the area.
intensive business processes, reduction of
existing paper stores and a move towards a
With increasing pressure to make services
‘born digital’ culture to drive cost savings and
more citizen-centric and to enhance
improve process efficiencies and customer
operational efficiencies, Thurrock, like most
service.
local authorities is undergoing a period of
Improved customer service
transformation. The Council’s Corporate
To drive the programme, the Service had to
through timely and accurate tenant
Plan 2013-2016 sets out an ambitious plan
overcome a number of challenges. Alistair
correspondence
to transform services to be more efficient,
Sharpe-Neal, Housing Transformation
Streamlined business processes
including ‘invest to save’ projects to bring
Manager at Thurrock explains: “One of our
including tenant correspondence and
further improvements in the medium term.
primary challenges was our inconsistent
approach to customer care. With the lack
housing management through intuitive
workflow
The Corporate Plan states ‘While ambitions
of a council-wide information management
remain high for the next three years, local
strategy and no integration across our core
OBJECTIVE CORPORATION LIMITED
government is facing a period of significant
housing systems, we operated a multitude
Regional Headquarters
change, driven by budget cuts and rising
of disjointed paper-based processes which
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demand for services. The Council will need
meant trying to find the right information to
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to develop new ways of working and service
provide a timely and accurate response to
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delivery models to remain viable.’
tenant enquiries was often difficult”.
CASE STUDY | THURROCK COUNCIL
Objective EDRMS underpins our policy to optimise
“the use
of information within the Housing Directorate
to increase customer responsiveness and facilitate
new ways of working in line with the Council’s
Digital Transformation, whilst making a significant
contribution towards our revenue budget savings.
”
Barbara Brownlee, Director of Housing, Thurrock Council
Without an effective information management
In addition to the EDRM software, Thurrock
system, Managers were unable to review
implemented complementary Information
and streamline many of their document-
Management modules including Objective
centric business processes, such as
Discover, an intuitive search tool providing
correspondence, housing management
refinement options that help guide users
activity, tenancy enforcement and planned
towards highly relevant information which
and responsive repairs to drive the proposed
••
Control and audit of core tenancy
documents within case files
••
Resource allocation for housing repairs
and improvements
To ensure that future information is ‘born
may have been hidden in simple search
digital’, Objective integrated EzeScan
results. Alistair explains “EDRMS coupled
software to scan housing related files directly
with a unified search experience offers the
into Objective via multi-functional devices
opportunity to search and find all relevant
(scanning printers). Digital capture of paper
The Council, working in partnership with
case information, correspondence, email
documents at this early stage in the process
Serco (their IT services provider), initially
and other records in one place”. With key
significantly reduces process lead times
implemented the Objective ‘Electronic
Housing information accessible from a single
arising from paper transfer, enabling housing
Document and Records Management’
repository, staff can now offer highly flexible
documents to be quickly scanned, captured
System (EDRM) solution in Housing Services
responses to customer requests in a timely
and classified into the EDRM system.
as a consolidated ‘electronic filing cabinet’
manner.
efficiency savings.
SHIFTING THE PAPERWORK
– providing secure, searchable access
to Housing information. The solution,
Integrated with scanning and workflow
which went live within 12 weeks, has now
technology, Objective Workflow is used
been rolled out across the Directorate to
manage both structured and unstructured
information, centralising key customer
interactions such as property and tenancy
to track, route and automate end-to-end
business processes resulting in substantial
efficiency and effectiveness improvements to:
The EDRMS implementation is steadily
reducing the departments administrative
support requirements, enabling officers
to ‘do their own admin’ through using the
existing MFD network to capture and route
documents and by capturing emails and
saving documents directly into the repository.
Customer Service through the automatic
The automation of these previously admin
file plan based on the sector-standard Local
handling, prioritising and allocation of a
intensive processes has contributed to a
Government Classification Scheme.
customer enquiry
documents, with an approved and consistent
••
50% reduction in administrative Full Time
Equivalents (FTEs) from 20 to 10, with the
opportunity for a further 3 FTE savings.
Through the automation
of admin-intensive tasks,
Objective Workflow has
enabled Thurrock Council
to streamline key housing
processes, improve
productivity and
promote new ‘digital’ ways
of working.
FACILITATING NEW WAYS OF WORKING
He continues “We have been able to close
and re-let area offices, rationalised remaining
With the move from paper to digital, key
offices into hot desks and free-up office and
interactions between council officers and
desk space, contributing to the reduction in
residents are now undertaken electronically
the volume of paper held by 80%”.
and seamlessly from any council location or
direct from customer homes. Staff now have
Implementing Objective EDRM has proved
confidence that the information they need will
essential in enabling the Housing Service to
be available to them whenever and wherever
deliver its transformation programme and
it is required. Sharpe-Neal comments “the
has accelerated the move towards paperless
focus on ‘digital by default’ has allowed
working using scanning, electronic document
for mobile working, without compromising
the quality or accuracy of the service we
provide.”
templates and forms, enabling teams to
reduce process times and provide quicker,
more accurate, customer responses.
As part of the wider Housing transformation
programme the project will help contribute
to £1.5 million in operational savings over the
next five years.
CASE STUDY | THURROCK COUNCIL
coupled with a
“unifiedEDRMS
search experience
offers the opportunity to search
and find all relevant case
information, correspondence,
email and other records in one
place
”
Alistair Sharpe-Neal, Housing Transformation Manager,
Thurrock Council
Barbara Brownlee, Director of Housing, at
deployment to deliver additional cost savings
ABOUT OBJECTIVE CORPORATION
Thurrock Council explains: “Objective EDRMS
and process efficiencies through further
Objective Corporation (ASX:OCL) is an
underpins our policy to optimise the use of
business process automation via workflow
established leader and specialist provider of
information within the Housing Directorate
and ‘Line of Business Integration’ with other
proven content, collaboration and process
to increase customer responsiveness and
key IT systems. The Objective solution will
management solutions for the public sector.
facilitate new ways of working in line with
be rolled out across the entire council to over
the Council’s Digital Transformation, whilst
1,250 users in a phased “by directorate”
Our solutions empower public sector
making a significant contribution towards our
approach by the end of December 2015
effectiveness, efficiency and transparency,
revenue budget savings”.
alongside an Office Refurbishment and
helping governments deliver better services at
integrated business change programme.
a lower cost to the community.
With a successful implementation within
Housing, Thurrock have taken the opportunity
Through direct customer engagement,
to build on the achievements to date
Objective is committed to delivering
and continue with a Corporate EDRMS
outcomes that have a positive effect on the
public sector, its citizens and the community.
Since 1987, we have been trusted by
Government Departments, Local Authorities
and a range of other public sector
organisations across the world.
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