Cash-strapped council IT teams to get backing for innovation projects

Posted on 27/04/2012 | 2 comments

By David Bicknell

IT teams in cash-strapped councils are being given a helping hand to drive new IT projects where teams believe technology innovation could drive positive change in local communities.

It follows the launch of a Future Fund created by mobile telecomms company O2 to help forward-thinking councils get to grips with new methods of engaging their staff, citizens and communities.

Successful local authorities applying for the scheme will be awarded access to O2 consultancy time, services and technology to help them turn their project ideas into reality.

The Future Fund open for applications on 25th April with three grant funding packages available to the value of £125,000, £75,000 and £50,000.

60 councils attended the launch event with the scheme focused on authorities developing ideas and services against three broad themes: reducing cost and improving efficiencies; finding new ways of engaging with citizens; and empowering the community to do more for itself.

Each of the topics points to more effective service delivery, by empowering staff or by expanding the concept of ‘self-service’.

To support the Fund’s launch, O2 plans to showcase 17 different parts of its business, each with their own unique slant on the digital age, from established technologies such as wi-fi to ‘people’ skills, social media expertise, mobile advertising and location-based services, as well as business engagement and apps development. Councils will be able to pick which selection of services to use to build their idea and weave into their bid.

O2 says it has created the Future Fund through its Local Government Futures Forum, which aims to understand what the role of IT should be in modernising councils in challenging times.

It argues that as technology advances at a rapid pace, with people creating and consuming data in more diverse and immediate ways, councils face a challenge to use these channels to demonstrate communications nous and find new ways to engage with their communities.

A recent consultation exercise found that budget cuts across the public sector have resulted in an expected automatic squeeze on resources, with mounting pressure across all departments to operate more efficiently and do more with less. 

With ongoing pressure to reduce spending, council decision-makers are opting for solutions that make an immediate impact – cutting services, and in turn cost – rather than looking at ways of adapting them, with IT departments facing an uphill struggle to retain and control their destinies, often competing for de-centralised budgets across multiple teams with no place or input at a board level.

Ben Dowd, Director of Business at O2 says: “O2 believes that the right application of technology has the potential to drive real change. Our findings through our work with local government IT departments support this belief. What is different is that the Future Fund will give a glimpse of what is possible with a bit of imagination and we will support the winning bids by providing investment in their IT infrastructure coupled with resource and expertise.

“So it is up to the councils to determine how it can be applied to their own council, citizens or community, ultimately giving local government the ability to shape their own destiny in a project they are passionate about.”

Applications for the Fund will be judged by a panel of experts from O2 and independent parties. Councils will then have eight weeks to develop and deliver their ideas, before selection takes place later this year.

www.o2.co.uk/futurefund

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Posted in change, cost reduction, efficiency savings, government, Government IT, innovation, local government, public sector, public services, SME

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Maude responds to fears over data-sharing between government agencies

Posted on 26/04/2012 | Leave a comment

By David Bicknell

Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude has responded to a Guardian story which reported that ministers are planning to shake up the law on using confidential personal data to make it easier for public-sector organisations to share confidential information supplied by the public.

The article had argued that “the proposals are similar to ‘database state’ legislation abandoned by the last Labour government in 2009 in the face of fierce opposition. That legislation was intended to reverse the basic data protection principle that sensitive personal information provided to one government agency should not normally be provided to another agency for a different purpose without explicit consent.”

Maude has responded to the Guardian piece, saying, “One of the guiding principles of this Government is the restoration of civil liberties and rolling back the intrusive state; that is why one of our first legislative acts was to scrap ID cards. So it is wrong to say our proposals are similar to the previous government’s abandoned “database state” legislation.

“We want people to be able to interact with government online, for example, in applying for benefits or a disabled parking permit, in a way that is quick, easy and secure. To do this we need to give them a way of proving their identity online, but only if they choose to. This would be done without a national, central scheme.

“This is all about putting the citizen in charge, not the state. But we are still taking great care to carefully consult on our plans. Throughout all our work in this area we have proactively engaged with privacy and consumer groups including NO2ID, Privacy International, Which?, London School of Economics, Oxford Internet Institute and Big Brother Watch.

“In June the Cabinet Office will publish, in a white paper, plans for improving data-linking across government. What will not be published in this white paper are any “fast-track” proposals that would require changes to the existing legislative landscape. Any such proposals will need careful consideration with the involvement of the public and interest groups with whom we will continue to engage.

“This is not a question of increasing the volume of data-sharing that takes place across government, but ensuring an appropriate framework is in place so that government can deliver more effective, joined-up and personalised public services, through effective data-linking.”

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Posted in data sharing, government, Government IT, openness and transparency

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Business need for reduced costs drives Cleantech demand

Posted on 26/04/2012 | Leave a comment

By David Bicknell

New research from audit specialist Grant Thornton has highlighted the change drivers behind the growing demand for cleantech products to reduce business costs.

Grant Thornton’s third annual International Business Report (IBR) report on the global cleantech industry shows that in general the adoption of cleantech products and practices is motivated by the commercial need to reduce costs and increase profits. It is no longer about being ‘green’.

For example, despite short-term fluctuations, the trend for key commodity prices continues upwards for example, Brent Crude oil recently rose back above US$120 a barrel. The outlook for nuclear energy is unclear following the Fukushima disaster – Germany, for example, has opted for the renewables route – and partly due to this uncertainty, cleantech is emerging as a suitable alternative source of energy or a means of reducing  consumption of expensive resources.

Over half of the business practitioners surveyed for the IBR who choose cleantech options do so to reduce their costs (52%); with 45% making the choice as a way to increase profitability. Corporate social responsibility (CSR) requirements and environmental concerns also remain important, but are not the main reason for adoption.

This increasing maturity of the sector is filtering through to expectations of cleantech business for the year ahead creating a bullish outlook for 2012.

Compared with companies in other sectors, the Grant Thornton report suggests that privately held businesses in the cleantech sector are now among the most confident enterprises in the world when it comes to future prosperity, far outpacing the optimism found in most global industries – and with good reason.

64% of cleantech businesses interviewed expect revenue to increase this year, up from 54% the previous year. 64% of respondents also expect higher profitability this year compared to 42% in 2011.  Cleantech providers currently see the greatest demand from the developed economies of Europe (51%), and US and Canada (39%).

Nathan Goode, head of energy, environment and sustainability at Grant Thornton UK said: “Interest in cleantech is no longer just about environmental concerns, it’s about whether it offers solutions that can boost the financial performance of companies. What we’re seeing is the potential for these technologies to compete with traditional forms of energy and the expectation that over time, they should.

“Governmental support remains key in many sectors and jurisdictions for cleantech to be successful, and fluctuations in this support are causing short term volatility for the cleantech arena. The mood of optimism in the sector appears to be driven by fundamental trends and reflected in broader indicators such as oil prices.

“Cleantech is a sector on the road to commercialisation but it is not necessarily all the way there yet. We’re at a stage now where the value proposition for cleantech is to save money and consequently demand for cleantech is set to increase meaning we could be on the cusp of something very big indeed.”

Cleantech and IT

The Grant Thornton report demonstrates how the cleantech sector is in transition. There are more companies involved in R&D (42%) and IT (29%) than in previous years (31% and 22% respectively).

Goode said: “Judging by this analysis, cleantech appears to have parallels with the biotech industry in that R&D is being used to explore new concepts and applications for existing technologies. As a result, R&D and IT is receiving greater focus as companies exploit advances in areas such as storage and smart grid technologies. In addition, the sector is adopting a broader base on which to apply its learning, putting greater focus on areas such as waste and water.”

In contrast, manufacturing activity has become relatively more subdued. The number of businesses citing involvement in manufacturing of energy efficient products has decreased over the past year from 26% in the 2012 survey to 19% in 2011, although manufacturing of products for cleantech energy generation has increased marginally to 17%, up from 14% the previous year.

There could be a number of reasons for this, but the Grant Thornton report stresses that the issue of capital constraint represents a big challenge for the sector and as a result, governments.

Goode added: “Manufacturing items such as wind turbines and waste processing plants is an incredibly capital intensive business.  However, what we’re seeing is a slowing in the pace of growth as a result of constraints on raising capital.  This continues to be an issue, especially in European economies where credit is constrained.

“Governments must be mindful of acting as a brake on investment, as it will quickly become a barrier to achieving carbon reduction targets and the desire to supply businesses and households with alternative supplies of energy – and at a time when it’s really starting to compete.”

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Posted in Campaign4Change, change management, cleantech, Climate Change, cost reduction, CSR, energy change, energy efficiency, environmental, Green IT, greentech, sustainability

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Cerner project over budget by 100 times amount of local heart monitor donations

Posted on 25/04/2012 | Leave a comment

By Tony Collins

When the Lord Mayor of Bristol presented a cheque for £20,000 to buy 10 cardiac monitors for local hospitals he could not have known that NHS officials were quietly spending more than 100 times that amount on an over-budget Cerner project.

A charity, the Frenchay Cardiac Support Group, raised the £20,000 through a shop and fund-raising events. It was 100th the amount  of the overspent element on a project to install an NPfIT Cerner patient administration system at the North Bristol NHS Trust.

Officials at NHS Connecting for Health and the Trust may consider it unfair of Campaign4Change to compare a charity donation with the unplanned extra costs of an IT-enabled change programme. But whereas North Bristol is accountable to local patients and fund-raisers for the £20,000 donation, it has no duty to explain to its patients (or anyone) how or why it has spent £5m on a Cerner project that was expected to cost the Trust about £3m.

The figures are buried deep in the Trust’s latest board papers. There has been no discussion of the overspend during the public part of the Board’s March meeting. Nor was it mentioned on the Board’s agenda for the meeting.

What the Trust says

The Trust declined our invitation to explain the overspend saying that it has commissioned a review of the Cerner project by PWC. Its statement to us said:

“North Bristol NHS Trust has commissioned an independent review into the issues surrounding the implementation of its new electronic patient record system. This will be carried out by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP.  The outcome of the review will be published in due course.  We do not feel it is appropriate to comment further until the conclusion of the review, which is expected to take several weeks.”

The Trust’s papers say that the majority of capital spending in January and February was on the Cerner project. The anticipated spending on the project will be more than £5m which would see the Trust considerably overspent because of the difficulties encountered, say the papers.

The same Board papers put the Trust’s IM&T overspending at about £2.3m. This is on top of the hundreds of millions of pounds that NHS Connecting for Health is paying BT to install Cerner at sites in the south of England, including north Bristol.

Comment:

NHS Trusts across London and the south of England are expected to install new Cerner systems in the coming years. London is in the midst of a major procurement, as is the south. If the disruption is as serious as in some earlier implementations thousands of patients will be affected. So what?

At North Bristol the NPfIT implementation of Cerner has gone seriously awry. Besides the duplication of medical records, disruption to appointments, and, for the first time, the missing of a two-week wait target for cancer patients, there have been at least 16 clinical incidents; and the Trust’s papers say there has been a “significant increase in DNA [Did Not Attend an appointment] rates since the implementation of Cerner”.

Time heals?

Does it matter? It will all settle down in time say NHS officials.

Indeed some in the NHS and the scientific community in general have a view that taking known risks are part and parcel of achieving Progress. If lives are lost pushing back frontiers of knowledge it is for the greater good. Hence the justification for risks taken in launches of the Space Shuttle and building new designs of bridges, tunnels and aircraft.

The greater good

It’s a philosophy not lost on officials at NHS Connecting for Health. Go-lives of electronic patient record systems will be disruptive and may even affect the care and treatment of patients. But it’s for the greater good and the damage won’t last too long. Besides, if the health of any individual patients is affected, this will be supposition: no official evidence will exist.

So should patients fear the implementation of new hospital-wide systems? It’s a little like the early flights of commercial aircraft. Most flights will go without incident but now and again a passenger jet will crash.

One difference between aircraft crashes and hospital IT implementations is that crashes are usually investigated by law, and lessons applied by regulatory authorities to make flying safer. The NHS has no duty to investigate or apply lessons from its IT-related mistakes. Which is one reason that the lessons from the Cerner implementation at Nuffield Orthopedic Centre in Oxford in 2005 have still not been learned. For example there were important differences in the way the Nuffield’s staff and doctors worked, and the way the system was designed to work.

Who would want to fly in an aircraft that hasn’t been certified as safe? So should patients experience an NHS that has uncertified patient record systems?

In aircraft crashes deaths are obvious. There is often a clear cause and effect. In the NHS there is no certification of IT systems. A hospital can go live with whatever systems it wants, whatever the effect on patients. Indeed the reporting of any damage to patients is down to the Trusts. That’s a clear conflict of interest – like relying on the builders of a supertanker to report the effects on wildlife and fish of an oil spillage.

It’s time for a change.

It’s time for the NHS – and the Department of Health and particularly NHS Connecting for Health – to get professional about hospital-wide IT implementations.

It’s time for regulation and certification, minimum standards of safety and independent reporting of disasters.

Links:

Does Hospital IT need airline-style certification?

Halt NPfIT Cerner projects says MP

NPfIT Cerner installation at Bristol as “more problems than anticipated”

Why is North Bristol Cerner project so expensive?

An ongoing IT crisis case study – North Bristol NHS Trust

Lessons from Cerner go-live at Nuffield in 2005.

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Posted in Campaign4Change, Government IT, managing change, managing outsourced services, NHS, npfit, openness and transparency, operational issues, oversight, Politics, private sector lessons for the public sector

Mutuals: “lean, people-focused businesses” trying to “climb a wall of technical complexity”

Posted on 25/04/2012 | Leave a comment

By David Bicknell

There are some insightful comments from Co-operatives UK’s secretary general Ed Mayo and the London Borough of Hammersmith & Fulham’s Andy Rennison on mutuals in this piece by People Management.

Mayo is quoted as saying, “At the moment we are asking people in public services to climb a wall of technical complexity, and the most urgent task for the mutuals programme is now to simplify it.”

He highlights taxation and procurement as the areas in most need of attention, and would ultimately like to see public sector mutuals given the same special dispensation as they have in Italy.

Rennison, Hammersmith & Fulham’s mutual lead, provides an interesting description of a well-attended bidders’ day held where 28 private organisations expressed an interest in being backers of the tri-borough’s (Westminster City Council and the London Borough of Kensington and Chelsea are also involved) schools IT services mutual project.

 “The feedback from one organisation was that we had too many people, we’ve got to cut this and cut that. But we felt that, actually, no, we’re already quite lean with a clear business plan which we’re confident we can deliver. That demonstrated their lack of understanding about what this business does – it’s a people-focused business.”

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Posted in Campaign4Change, employee ownership, local government, mutualisation, mutuals, procurement, public services, social economy, social enterprise

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New York’s new CIO to create centre of excellence to prevent failing IT projects

Posted on 25/04/2012 | Leave a comment

By David Bicknell

New York’s recent problems with IT projects have been well documented.

Its latest solution: appoint a new CIO, with a wide remit that includes innovation and the setting up of a ‘centre of excellence’  to nail down failing projects.

Rahul Merchant joins with a background served at US mortgage and housing specialist Fannie Mae and at financial services company Merrill Lynch.

He will become the first Citywide Chief Information and Innovation Officer and Commissioner of the Department of Information, Technology and Telecommunications reporting to New York’s mayor Michael Bloomberg.

His role will involve overseeing New York’s information technology development and management, with a focus on delivering technology projects on-time and on-budget.

Merchant will succeed Carole Post, who recently announced she will be leaving for a position at New York Law School.

“By bringing the City’s IT infrastructure and development under one office, we can ensure we are using best practices across agencies, leveraging the City’s enormous IT infrastructure to our maximum advantage and holding contractors accountable for delivering results,” said Bloomberg. “Rahul is a seasoned executive who has proven himself time and again as a leader and an innovator in the industry.  He is going to do an outstanding job as New York City’s first Chief Information and Innovation Officer and we are excited to add him to our talented team.”

Merchant will be responsible for New York City’s IT infrastructure, as well as oversight of the implementation of key technology initiatives that enable the City’s various agencies to serve 8.4 million New Yorkers.

What will be worth watching is seeing how he tackles New York’s reputation for troubled IT projects by creating a Centre of Excellence that will  “standardise business processes for the implementation of large technology projects, institute a system of vendor evaluation to hold contractors accountable for meeting project milestones, and update the City’s technology contracts to focus on the delivery of established milestones to meet agency business needs.”

According to Bloomberg, Merchant will work closely with agency commissioners and chief information officers “to ensure that IT projects leverage existing infrastructure and software to the maximum possible extent, and that the City’s overall IT budget meets core agency business needs and the City’s overall technology objectives.”

He will also spearhead the New York’s efforts to remain a leader in technology innovation, by leveraging its  technology assets and partnerships with academic institutions, technology firms, and entrepreneurs.

He won’t be short of people to help. Merchant will lead a 1,200-strong staff responsible for managing the City’s information technology infrastructure as well as serving the information technology needs of 45 mayoral agencies, dozens of other governmental entities, and nearly 300,000 employees.

Here’s how local sites reported Merchant’s appointment:

Crain’s New York Business: Major taps Merrill Lynch vet to tame tech projects

Tech President: New York City just radically changed who manages its IT projects

Government Technology: NYC names Rahul Merchant to CIO and Innovation role

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Posted in change, change management, CIO, contractors, Government IT, innovation, IT projects, IT-related failures, technology, US Government

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Winds of energy change blow through Germany and China

Posted on 24/04/2012 | 1 comment

By David Bicknell

Change in government priorities and policies can drive structural change that generates significant investment and growth. That is now particularly the case in energy production projects in the aftermath of the Fukushima disaster.

From this article on Business Green, it appears that Germany  is set for a significant investment in wind power with the setting up of a number of offshore wind farms with new hydroelectric power plants in the offing too.

German energy companies and investors are ready to plough up to €60bn into overhauling the country’s power infrastructure, following the government’s pledge to phase out nuclear reactors.

The energy and water industry association BDEW issued a report on the first day of the Hanover industrial fair revealing that plans are underway to build or modernise 84 power stations with a combined capacity of 42GW.

As Business Green says, the report also provides one of the most detailed insights to date on how the German energy sector plans to cope with the government’s commitment to phase out nuclear capacity in the country post-Fukushima.

Another recent article shows that China is making similar investments in wind energy, spending the equivalent of £4bn in the North-Western Gansu region.

As Jonathan Watts reports, “Wind turbines, which were almost unknown five years ago, stretch into the distance, competing only with far mountains and new pylons for space on the horizon. Jiuquan alone now has the capacity to generate 6GW of wind energy – roughly equivalent to that of the whole UK. The plan is to more than triple that by 2015, when this area could become the biggest wind farm in the world.

“Although it is the world’s biggest CO2 emitter and notorious for building the equivalent of a 400MW coal-fired power station every three days, it is also erecting 36 wind turbines a day and building a robust new electricity grid to send this power thousands of miles across the country from the deserts of the west to the cities of the east.

“It is part of a long-term plan to supply 15 per cent of the country’s energy from renewable sources by 2020. Most of that will come from nuclear and hydropower, but the government is also tapping the wind and solar potential of the deserts, mountain plateaus and coastlines.”

Meanwhile, Britain could pump £13bn into the economy and create up to 10,000 jobs by upgrading its power distribution network with smart grid technology, according to a Reuters report.

The technology has the potential to transform the way electricity is generated, distributed and consumed just as the Internet transformed the way the world communicates.

The idea is to create a communication network to maximise efficiency in supply and demand and to cut costs for homes and businesses.

Related Reading

UK smart grid could create jobs, help economy

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Posted in Climate Change, energy change, government, Green IT, greentech, project management, sustainability

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Information Age article questions Cabinet Office scrutiny of IT projects

Posted on 23/04/2012 | Leave a comment

By David Bicknell

Information Age has written an interesting piece examining the Cabinet Office’s scrutiny of IT projects worth over £1m.

It says that despite pledging to publish regular performance data on IT projects worth over £1m, the Cabinet Office is not even collecting the data.

It reports, “The Cabinet Office is not collecting data about the performance of government IT projects worth over £1 million, despite having made a commitment to publish this information regularly as open data.

“In February 2011, the Cabinet Office published performance data for all major IT projects up until July 2010 (just before the current government came into office)  on open data portal data.gov.uk. At the time, it said that the data would “updated regularly”, but that “the specific form of future publications has not yet been determined”.

A Freedom of Information Act request from Information Age revealed that the Cabinet Office is not collecting this data. In its response to the request, the department revealed that it holds “no recorded information … relating to the performance of ICT projects over £1m”.

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Posted in government, Government IT, IT projects

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How many organisations are failing to deliver on their Agile developments?

Posted on 23/04/2012 | 1 comment

By David Bicknell

How many organisations are struggling to see real value and business benefits from their Agile IT projects?

This blog, looking back at some of the predictions for Agile in 2012, argues that a number of organisations that have adopted Agile have an inability to understand its why and how, while others are inadaquately prepared for adoption, resulting in a failure to address management impact across teams and engineering practices in teams.

The piece cites the Cutter Consortium blog which, in looking ahead to 2012, argued that “many organisations worldwide will continue to adopt Agile. Most of them will do so with no expert guidance, with ho-hum results, and with little understanding of why they got those results.

It suggestted that, “People will continue to get their Agile skills certified while others rail against the value and implication of those certificates. Companies will still rely on head hunters to hire Agile coaches, and wonder why those coaches can’t seem to straighten out their Agile implementation.

“Organisations will continue to agonise over micro-estimation of detailed backlogs. They will continue to spend a pretty penny on “adding bodies” to projects riddled with technical debt, while not investing in the skills and habits their developers need to reduce or avoid increasing such debt. Managers will continue to use language like, “We just hired a resource in development” without investing proper attention in the hired person. And downsizings will continue until morale improves.”

Another blog predicted that, “Everyone will claim they are Agile, but that 50% of them will be wrong, and half of the rest won’t get any value from it. There are too many bad development practices at organisations that have too few people, with too little coaching, and hardly any tooling.”

Meanwhile, this survey suggests that Agile development has a higher priority in the private sector (in the US) than in the public sector.

So what is the true picture for Agile? Is it delivering project success, as JP Morgan and John Deere, have found? Or are some organisations adopting Agile almost as a fashion accessory, without really understanding where they’re going?

Related reading

Agile skills gain ground

JP Morgan adopts Agile in Australia

As Agile as a John Deere tractor

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Posted in Agile, change management, Government IT, IT and the Business, IT projects, managing change, project management

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US federal procurer GSA cancels Oracle’s Schedule 70 IT contract

Posted on 22/04/2012 | Leave a comment

By David Bicknell

Something unexplained appears to be happening in the contractual relationship between US federal procurers and Oracle.

As this story from InformationWeek details, the US federal government has cancelled Oracle’s services contract on the the General Services Administration’s (GSA) IT Schedule 70. The US government spent $388 million on Oracle products and services through Schedule 70 in the 2011 financial year.

The GSA is an agency that helps with procurement services for other government agencies. As part of this effort, it maintains the GSA Schedule,  something akin to a collection of pre-negotiated contracts from which other agencies can use to buy goods and services.

Procurement managers from government agencies can view these agreements and make purchases from the GSA Schedule knowing that all legal obligations have been taken care of by GSA.

IT Schedule 70 is the largest and most widely used acquisition vehicle in the US federal government. Schedule 70 is an indefinite delivery indefinite quantity (IDIQ) multiple award schedule, providing direct access to products and services from over 5,000 certified industry partners.

The GSA detailed its cancellation of the Oracle contract in a tightly worded announcement on its website. There has been no further explanation for the contract cancellation and no comment to date from Oracle.

The contract cancellation has also been reported on other blogs in the US:

GSA cancels Oracle IT contract

Six months after suit between them settles, GSA ends contract with Oracle

Feds nix Oracle blanket contract

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Posted in procurement, US Government

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