The project issues
The ICT Service is performing well within the Council - apart from a few minor areas where effort could be used more effectively. The key issue to emerge, however, was that the Council lacked an overall strategy for e-government and for the role of ICT in its corporate agenda.

Socitm Consulting was brought in by the ICT BV Review Team to review the Best Value work which had been done to date and to provide an objective view.

The Socitm Consulting solution
The BV Review was undertaken following a relatively standard approach - examining the evidence of the department's work, its costs, and what it delivered. In addition, interviews were held with all senior staff of the Council to examine their respective views of the ICT service.

The findings were that while the ICT service was performing well (it scored well on most of the key indicators), it lacked a strategic framework within the Council, within which to work. The consultants put this point to the BV Review Team, and proposed two options - to continue with the BV Review in its limited sense, or to open up the issue of the strategic framework for the Council. The Council chose the latter, as a result of which two workshops were held with senior management to set a vision for the Council, and to develop an outline strategic approach for achieving it, within which the ICT service would have a clear role.

The outcomes from the workshops are currently being taken forward within the Council.

The benefits to the client
The study delivered not only the BV review of ICT, but also tackled the problem identified by the study, that the Council lacked a strategic framework within which ICT could be effectively deployed. A number of specific recommendations were offered to the Council, which are now being deliberated.

Project identification
Client organisation: Aberdeenshire Council
Client contact: John Mackenzie, Head of IT, 01224 664 317, john.mackenzie@aberdeenshire.gov.uk
Lead consultant: doug.maclean@socitm.gov.uk 
Project no: 4712