City of Newcastle replaces disparate systems with TechnologyOne enterprise solution

The City of Newcastle is working with TechnologyOne to improve customer service by replacing disparate IT systems with an enterprise solution, OneCouncil.

On 1 July 2014, council launched the first release of TechnologyOne’s preconfigured OneCouncil solution covering finance, supply chain, payroll and employee self-service.

Council’s IT manager, Greg Brent, said council was running early versions of TechnologyOne financials, supply chain and enterprise content management (ECM) along with various other systems and chose to re-implement the full TechnologyOne enterprise solution while adopting the proven processes of OneCouncil.

“We needed to shift from a best-of-breed approach to an enterprise solution, in order to support the internal drive for more effective service delivery,” Brent said. “We had a number of different corporate applications and a multitude of spreadsheets that were not designed to work together. This meant we were constantly implementing and managing a number of interfaces to facilitate end-to-end transactions across the disparate applications. Development and maintenance of these interfaces is time-consuming and expensive with a less than satisfactory outcome.

“OneCouncil offered a single, integrated enterprise solution built on a single modern platform, with a consistent look and feel. The preconfigured solution provides automated processes and reduces manual inefficiencies.

“By spending less time on making the different systems work together, we will be able to focus on improved customer service. Once implementation is complete we have also forecast significant cost savings to the organisation by reducing licensing, ongoing management and support fees. We will use the new software as a platform to re-engineer our business processes and drive further improvements across council.”

OneCouncil will replace council’s legacy systems, including Civica Authority, Chris 21 and various in-house systems, opting to move away from its previous best-of-breed approach.

The first release of implementation is now complete with TechnologyOne financials, supply chain, human resource and payroll, and employee self-service now live.

“The implementation came in on time and on budget, largely due to the ‘One Team’ approach we have established with TechnologyOne. The success of the first release is a testament to this approach and the power of working with a single vendor that takes complete accountability for the implementation and support of its products.”

The second phase of the project will see the implementation of the remainder of the enterprise solution, including Enterprise Budgeting, Asset Management, Business Intelligence, ECM, Performance Planning, Property & Rating and a Customer Relationship Management module, between now and July 2015.

TechnologyOne Executive Chairman Adrian Di Marco said OneCouncil was developed in collaboration with more than 250 local governments to deliver proven practice business processes and accelerated implementations for customers.

“Our preconfigured solutions dramatically reduce implementation time, cost and risk and are continually relevant because we keep up to date with changing technology, legislation and business practices.

“As demonstrated by our long-standing relationship with The City of Newcastle, TechnologyOne customers benefit from a strong, continuing competitive advantage through an enterprise solution that adapts and evolves by embracing new technologies, concepts and innovation.”

The City of Newcastle has been working with TechnologyOne since1996 and was the company’s first local government customer.