Deploying A Citizen Service PlatformA roadmap for local government

www.microsoft.com.au/government

Case Management

Mobile & Unified Communications

Citizen & StaffPortals

CoreInfrastructure

Enterprise ContentManagementPerformance

Management

Many government organisations have already signed licensing agreements with Microsoft to gain affordable access to the latest operating systems and office productivity software.

Review your agreement. You may already be licensed to use many of the software applications featured in this brochure. If not, your licence can easily be extended to include additional products so that you can start to build a consistent and integrated platform for citizen services.

Windows Vista® and the Microsoft® Office System provide friendly, familiar interfaces for your citizen service solutions, helping to broaden customer access and reduce user training.

You may already have what it takes! The Microsoft Citizen Service Platform The Microsoft Citizen Service platform comprises the IT infrastructure and applications local councils may need to help improve services. It enables you to take a phased approach to introducing solutions, such as case management, enterprise content management, flexible and mobile communications, performance reporting and more.

Microsoft interoperability and support for standards helps you to leverage partner solutions, your existing systems, and connect to other government organisations to share services and data. Many capabilities are provided by standard products. However, we also provide templates based around Microsoft® Office SharePoint® Server and Microsoft Dynamics® CRM to deliver specific local government solutions.

Applications and Templates Packages

The Citizen Service Platform Layer

People, Services and Processes

The Business Challenges

Consolidate Your Infrastructure

If you are planning to deliver secure online services, you will require an IT platform that connects easily with other systems and protects personal information and data. As well as being cost-efficient to manage, it should also be eco-friendly.

Start by virtualising your servers to reduce complexity and improve operating efficiency through consolidation. This helps reduce carbon emissions while establishing an agile, adaptable platform for citizen services that is simpler to manage.

• Virtualise and consolidate servers to help reduce your carbon footprint and IT complexity.

• Run multiple operating systems in parallel on a single server.

• Virtualise your applications and provide remote access to standard Windows-based programs by running them on a terminal server.

• Combine Windows Vista Enterprise with the Microsoft® Desktop Optimization Pack to inventory and manage your PCs remotely, control desktop permissions and group policies, deliver applications on demand and even virtualise them to run as network services.

• Manage physical and virtual IT environments across data centres, PCs and devices from one console.

• Help protect your information with integrated antivirus, antispyware, malware removal and system recovery tools.

Optimise your servers

Optimise yourdesktop

Management and security

“We are saving a lot of money on servicing our desktop PCs and servers. There’s no travel time, and we can schedule updates to take place automatically when staff are not working.” Andrew Sutherland, IT Manager, Mid-Western Regional Council

Increase straight- through processing

Share authorised information online

Establish a case management system

Streamline Your Internal Processes

To provide citizen services in a consistent and compliant manner you need to streamline and, where possible, automate the business processes behind the services.

Two key areas can often be addressed: firstly, the way that information – such as correspondence, evidence and documents – is managed. Secondly, the way that cases – such as applications for grants, permits or the preparation of official records – are coordinated between departments and organisations.

• Help enable staff to share information, automate tasks, schedule meetings, complete forms online and access common calendars and address books.

• Collect and manage data with more ease and create rich electronic forms to help streamline and standardise government processes.

• Create collaboration workspaces to connect staff with information and people within a department, an agency or across the whole of government.

• Integrate workflows that help enable seamless document routing and approval, with automated reminders and follow-up actions.

• Help simplify grant, permit or record processing with a standardised, electronic system that follows all legislative directives.

• Track payments easily with integration into financial systems.

• Give staff quick, reliable access to information and tools to efficiently address enquiries.

“Documents are uploaded in under a minute, as opposed to whenever the intranet manager found the time – which could be over several hours or days.” Meagan Lawrie, Officer, Workplace Change, Wyong Shire Council

Streamline Shared Services Between Agencies

Sharing services and information across different business units or organisations is achieved most efficiently through a common Web portal. This provides a convenient one-stop shop for all of the interactions and information people need.

A simple change of name or address could then be recorded across driver’s licence, electoral roll, child support benefits, Medicare card, etc. through one interaction, simplifying processes for both citizens and government.

Connect your systems

Make shared services available online

Create a case management process

• Connect proprietary and standards-based systems inside and across organisations.

• Exchange data and orchestrate business processes across multiple systems.

• Collate information from diverse government agencies into portal sites.

• Centrally managed site design, publishing and deployment capabilities seamlessly integrate cutting-edge Web content management into the overall portal platform.

• Track constituent enquiries across organisations.

• Quickly route requests to the appropriate organisation.

• Use automatic workflows to help increase employee effectiveness.

• Respond to internal or external event triggers with a compliant workflow.

“The Integrated Client Management System gives us crucial information we didn’t have access to before such as identifying the known members of a household around a child at any point in time.” Andrew Spina, Executive Director, ICT Reform, Shared Information Solutions, Queensland Government

Establish a business intelligence platform

Publish reports and performance metrics

Help accurate planning with detailed models

Plan Accurately And Foster A Culture Of Performance And Accountability

To provide the right level and type of citizen services, you need to anticipate needs, accurately forecast and predict budgets and spot trends. In addition, organisations are increasingly required to track and publish performance metrics.

This requires more than data; it requires business intelligence. To achieve this, you will need to bring together data from many different sources, consolidate it, and expose it in an easy-to-view format at the right level of detail for staff.

• Integrate data from diverse databases and provide a real-time, consolidated view of data.

• Create reports and deliver them through familiar Microsoft applications to the right people where and when they need them.

• Use sophisticated data mining and visualisation tools to plan by creating ‘what if?’ analyses.

• Publish and manage reports centrally on the Web and deliver user‑specific dashboards.

• Provide dynamic key performance indicators (KPI) relevant to individuals or roles.

• Build processes into workflows that prompt staff to comply with specific procedures.

• Create dashboards that enable managers to see trend lines for departments or scenarios with real-time variances between plan and actual.

• Create detailed models and flexible plans that synchronise across departments and organisational hierarchies.

“Using Microsoft® Office SharePoint®

Server 2007 would allow the council to move from reactive reporting to a dynamic, interactive dashboard approach.” Tony Herald, Chief Information Officer, Information Technology Branch, Maroochy Shire Council

Deliver unified messaging

Provide VoIP and videoconferencing

Deploy mobile applications

Deploy Mobile Applications And Flexible Communications

Increasingly, citizens and staff are more comfortable communicating by email, SMS, online or even video-conferencing, rather than by phone, mail or in person.

Giving the public and your own staff greater flexibility in how they communicate helps you to deliver citizen services more efficiently. Government staff can also work more effectively with applications on their mobile devices so that they can stay in touch and work as they go.

• Help deliver unified messaging (e-mail, voice mail, faxes and calendaring) to staff inboxes.

• Staff can dial in to hear and act on their calendars, listen to e-mail and voice mail, manage contacts or call.

• A powerful Web mail client helps staff stay connected when they are in the field.

• Provide staff with instant messaging, VoIP, audio and video conferencing by integrating your existing phone systems.

• Provide presence so that staff can see at a glance if someone is available and click to call, send an instant message or start a video conference.

• With a Windows Mobile‑powered device, staff can send and receive e-mails, view and edit calendars and contacts and work using custom mobile applications as well as Microsoft® Office Word and Excel®.

“Our mobility solutions have practically eliminated paperwork and almost doubled the amount of time rangers can spend in the community.”Troy Green, Director of Technology and Corporate Services, Tweed Shire Council

Provide Citizen Services OnlinePersonalised Web portals for citizens and businesses are an ideal way of expanding access to government information and services with less paperwork and fewer interactions. They also provide a single source of truth for all interactions.

The three key considerations are: how to aggregate information from diverse systems and make it available online; how to manage access and identity for large numbers of users; and how to integrate the functionality you offer online with processes that prompt staff or automated systems to provide the services or information required.

Aggregate information and publish it online

Protect citizen information

Establish automated workflows for staff

• Collate information into portal sites to suit the specific requirements of each audience.

• Centrally managed site design, publishing and deployment capabilities seamlessly integrate cutting-edge Web content management into the overall portal platform.

• Help protect data with advanced firewalls, VPN connections, and authentication policies.

• Manage strong credentials such as smartcards with an integrated approach that pulls together metadirectory, certificate and password management across systems.

• Track constituent enquiries, regardless of channel.

• Route requests to the appropriate department.

• Use automatic workflows to help increase employee effectiveness.

• Easily schedule follow‑up actions with alerts.

“With a single view of customer information, our customer-facing staff will be able to respond consistently to enquiries without the need to divert calls to other areas of council. This will improve satisfaction for our constituents and increase efficiency for our staff.” Phil Stone, Director, Planning & Information, Baw Baw Shire Council

An Extensive Partner Network 4 Established base of solutions

providers and systems integrators.

4 Hosting options for mission‑critical IT environments.

4 Services to keep your IT running optimally.

A Solid Platform For Growth4 Invest incrementally and scale easily.

4 Friendly, familiar Microsoft user experience minimises staff training.

4 Robust, multi‑layered security.

Software + Services4 The powerful capabilities of

software on a wide range of devices combined with the flexibility of services online provide advanced, fully featured communications, collaboration and applications for field workers.

4 Sophisticated synchronisation and enterprise-class storage and security capabilities – managed or hosted.

Reliable Service And Support4 Expert technical consultancy and

resources available from partners and Microsoft Premier support.

An Interoperable Platform4 Consistent standards, operating

systems and application compatibility.

4 Integration with existing technology to maximise your investments.

Privacy And Security4 Security, identity and trust

relationships are built into hardware, software and services.

Flexible Delivery And Purchasing4 Attractive government licensing

options enable you to budget, plan and manage assets more easily.

If you are planning a citizen services solution, talk to Microsoft and our partners. With thousands of reference sites and successful deployments across the world, Microsoft partners have both the experience and expertise to help you assess your IT infrastructure and select and deploy cost-effective, proven solutions that meet your needs today and tomorrow.

To learn more about the Microsoft Citizen Service Platform visit www.microsoft.com.au/government or email localgov@microsoft.com

This document is provided by way of general information only and should not be relied upon without obtaining independent advice. ©2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Microsoft, the Microsoft logo BizTalk, Excel, Forefront, Microsoft Dynamics, the Microsoft Dynamics logo, the Office logo, PerformancePoint, SharePoint, SQL Server, Windows, Windows Vista, Windows Server, Windows Mobile and the Windows logo are trademarks of the Microsoft group of companies. 12451‑1108/MS

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