Local Government as a Platform, Low Code and the challenges posed by coronavirus
Local Government as a Platform involves the reorganising the work of local government around a network of shared APIs and commodity components, open-standards and canonical datasets, so that councils can deliver radically better services to citizens.
In the age of COVID-19 and as councils face the twin challenges of decreasing funding and increasing demand, they have to find new ways of using technology to deliver services more effectively and enable their staff and members to work in new ways, increasing productivity and reducing costs. This has to be considered and delivered in a fraction of the time pre-pandemic. Now that we are living with Coronavirus in a new normal, digital services have to be delivered in near-real time. Many services councils used to deliver will need to be stopped whilst new, digital-first services will need to be brought online.
Never before has Local Government needed to build based on a platform, leveraging tools that can be used toegther to quickly build and deploy 'apps' that deliver clear, accessible and easy to use digital services that meet users needs.
So what is ‘Local Government as a Platform’ or ‘LGaaP’?
Government as a Platform (GaaP) was created by the UK Government Digital Service (GDS) in order to solve the most frequent challenges across the public sector. By addressing these issues once and creating common, standardised and user tested components that can be used across the public sector, digital service teams are able to design and deliver digital services much faster to a very high standard.
Standing up digital services quickly
By leveraging a low-code website engagement, content management and forms platform, council can connect back office or cloud services to deliver end to end solutions. For example, creating a booking and payment service (a common local government service pattern), can leverage Jadu Forms, GOVUK Pay (for easy, secure payment processing), Office 365 Calendar (for reserving a slot), GOVUK Notify for notifications and Jadu CXM (for Case Management). During the easing of lockdown, many local authorities leveraged these services for reserving a ‘Trip to the Tip’ - reserving a slot at a recycling centre.
Leveraging ‘commodity’ services
Local Government as a Platform calls for using a ‘Lego block’ approach to services in which government departments utilise off-the-shelf ‘plug and play’ systems that are increasingly readily available over the internet, rather than spending time and money to develop bespoke systems for each department. These commodity-type systems would handle such functions as licensing, booking, registration, payments and case management.
Sharing best practice
By sharing the best practice and innovation being rapidly developed now, we reduce the time to deliver, the costs and ensure digital service is right first time for citizens.
When we deliver digital services now, the common service patterns, eForms, workflows, widgets and apps are shared on the Jadu Library - this is where our community of users can upload and share service patterns and best practice freely.
To support the ongoing and escalating Coronavirus crisis, Jadu has launched a Community Toolbox: http://jadu.net/library/toolbox.
Channel Shift RESET
The vision of 'new normal' looks like more social distancing, local focus, ensuring and shoring-up supply chains, and getting used to new ways of social interaction through technology.
We will need to share best practice rapidly and at an unprecedented level. Services will need to be re-enabled to be digital first and in many cases, digital only. This means we will need to develop a 'reverse business case' to plan for deactivating or not reactivating traditional methods of delivering service.
Delivering Local Government as a Platform with Low Code
The Jadu Continuum Platform of Web Content Management, eForms & Payments and Case Management tools are developed from the ground-up, created by and for Government. It provides Local Government agencies with security, audit and workflow - all delivered on an 'upgrade-free' continuously released platform.
Jadu is a new way of building digital services leveraging Low Code. Jadu are creating a set of shared components, service designs, platforms, data and hosting, that any government service can use and meet accessibility compliance and regulations as well as deliver a rich and engaging customer experience.
Birmingham City Council
A digital success story as Europe's largest local authority serving over one million customers, implements Jadu Continuum to better serve its customers.
London Borough of Hounslow
A new way to deliver digital services using 'lite' CRM and how they implemented and integrated a ‘real-time’ digital customer services platform.
Swindon Borough Council
In 2017 Swindon launched their first Jadu CXM digital service and within two days 1,300 subscriptions had been set-up. They now have over 67 case types in place and over 23,176 subscribers.
Jadu Continuum benefits
With proven Agile implementation methods and have a powerful community of users including Birmingham City Council, The Royal Borough of Kingston and Manchester City Council, the Jadu Continuum platform provides a suite of web productivity tools that simply delivers.
We enable public sector organisations, government departments and local authorities to provide engaging customer-friendly web experiences that focus on user needs with an outstanding reputation for accessibility.
All the right tools
Jadu is an extensible platform allowing integration with CRM, document / financial / case management systems along with online payment merchants.
With the right tools for customer engagement we can help your organisation work efficiently towards objectives set by Government and the need to make savings through channel shift.
We continue to specialise in developing applications and technology that help government organisations achieve excellence.
Manchester City Council
We created a responsive and user centred design, beautifully presented utilising the Jadu platform like never before. Jadu worked closely with Manchester to produce something truly unique and that's changed the face of local government websites.
Read the Manchester case study.
Royal Borough of Kingston
The challenge local authorities currently face is how to reduce costs whilst maintaining the quality of services and improving customer access to those services. Kingston’s answer is a programme of work called Customer First.
Read the Kingston Council case study.
Our channel shift white paper
Channel shift is a concept we are very adept at understanding and provide the tools and knowledge to make it happen.
Web Content Management
Keep your customers up to date, create and publish engaging web content securely and easily and on all devices.
eForms and Payments
Build secure and easy-to-use online forms, with flexible integrations and end-to-end transactions such as applications or payments.
Case Management
Your own digital concierge, providing a seamless experience and effective digital customer self-service.