Local Government - Custom Application Design

Comhairle nan Eilean Siar (CnES), the Council providing services in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland, is an organisation with a clear Corporate Strategy, neatly defined and laid out as a set of aims and objectives. To help it achieve these aims, in early 2004 the Council began searching for a new performance management system which could to provide a greater degree of accountability for its activities.

"Key information was trapped on paper in departmental business plans, and often only surfaced in quarterly reports. We needed a more regular strategic overview of all the Council's activities to monitor the ongoing effectiveness of each individual area," comments Andrew MacKenzie, CnES Head of Internal Strategy who commissioned the project.

After assessing several suppliers, CnES was stunned by a disparately low quote from open source experts The Linux Centre. The Council looked into the offer in more detail, and, after some deliberation, decided to commission the centre. With prior experience of working with commercial software developers, and knowing the budget that had been negotiated, project manager Helen MacKenzie prepared herself for some major compromises.

"We had seen the bespoke systems developed by neighbouring councils, but as a smaller organisation we knew the costs would be prohibitive," explains Helen MacKenzie. "At the price we could afford, I was fully expecting to have to shoehorn our processes into a badly fitting off-the-shelf solution. But with The Linux Centre this could not have been further from the truth."The Linux Centre representatives meeting with CnES management

After a series of meetings to assess the Council's exact needs, The Linux Centre produced a working demonstration system in under a month. Impressed by the speed and efficiency of the development, the Council's surprise did not stop there.

By using the freely distributed MySQL database running on Linux webservers, The Linux Centre was able to channel more of the budget into development. This left time and capacity for further refinement and customisation. Taking full advantage of this opportunity, CnES convened a user-group with representatives drawn from throughout the organisation to provide end-user input on the final refinements to the new system.

"The additional customisation work was a blessing for the entire project," explains Helen MacKenzie. "It is all too easy for staff to perceive this type of performance management system as 'big brother' imposing a system to keep tabs on them. By incorporating ideas from the user group, we were able to design a more inclusive system, which now fits with the end-users' ways of working and actually helps them to work more efficiently."

With projects and services often spit between the Council's four main offices, the system needed the flexibility to handle both disparate activities and remote and mobile workers. The Linux Centre's use of web-based technology provided the perfect solution. Staff moving between offices can now access data and update systems from any machine with an authorised connection to the council extranet. Officers travelling further afield to meetings in Edinburgh and Glasgow can use the internet to access up to the minute data and work on the system between meetings.

"The system is effectively accessible from any computer with internet access, which fits perfectly with our decentralisation, modernisation and accountability programmes. In the future we can offer staff flexible working arrangements and even provide members of the public with limited access to monitor the Council's work," predicts Helen MacKenzie. "The openness of the technology, and the responsiveness of The Linux Centre also means that we are considering future work to add workflow functionality, and to integrate the system with the document management system and even the financial ledger."

"We commissioned a system to monitor our achievement of the Corporate Strategy. The cost benefits of using The Linux Centre have enabled us to incorporate frameworks for departmental business plans, capital programmes, and even Best Value reviews of services into the same system," concludes Andrew MacKenzie. "With it based on open source software, we can scale the system up, make it available to new users and there are still no licensing costs. Having seen what can be achieved, we are now viewing this as a pilot project for a far broader use of Linux and other open source technology."