Planning for the future
As the product owner for the Built Environment suite, it is my responsibility to understand market changes and trends. As such I’ve been closely watching the comments and responses to the Government’s Planning for the Future white paper. It’s been particularly interesting to see discussions going on around the newly proposed zoning concepts rather than the adoption of technology.
The key digital freedoms for the public sector
Much has been made of the unprecedented nature of 2020 and the innovation that accompanied the response to the demands of the pandemic. On reflection, I think last year changed the way we think about innovation (or at least the emphasis of it). We moved away from new entrants disrupting stale markets and faced a ‘stress test’ of the technology infrastructure that the public sector in particular had put in place in the latter half of the 2010s.
Cloud tech is not a fad: IBM split signals a change in the tides
By now, we have all seen the news that the tech giant IBM is splitting itself into two public companies, in a bid to shift its focus towards the high margin businesses of cloud and artificial intelligence. In my view, the writing has been on the wall for a decade that a tectonic shift in the relationship between business and technology is coming. This split represents part of that shift.
How Local Land Charges can aid the recovery of the Economy
At first glance, the idea of land charges doesn’t conjure the most exciting of images to mind. Often the service is tucked away in the back office somewhere, only dealt with when necessary. I don’t think that, in the two decades I’ve spent responding to tenders, that I’ve seen a tender for a land charges solution that includes planning and building control. Normally the land charge staff are the last to see a solution during a demonstration at the end of a long day. Maybe land charges is the underappreciated ‘Cinderella’ of public services.
The shared challenge for local authorities and their citizens, and why tech is the solution
We started the year of 2020 talking about Brexit and single-use plastic, we’d pretty much all planned our holidays out, and we had all fallen into a trap of thinking that we knew where we would be by the end of it. The public sector was no exception.
Constructing a more automated future for building control inspections
With 2020 a tipping point for the digitalisation of building control and other crucial infrastructure services, we’re seeing many organisations look to cloud technologies as a way to maintain service delivery whilst managing risk.
Planning software suppliers can be truly creative in the current market- we just need the nod
I read this report from the Connected Place Catapult with great interest. I don’t disagree with the six principles outlined in the report. In fact, at Arcus we try to put these principles into action every day. However, in focusing wholly on the software suppliers, the report misses an opportunity to highlight some more fundamental issues.
Why we shouldn’t go back to normal after COVID-19 – let your cloud be the silver lining
With people imagining what life will be like following the current pandemic, you often see them quoted as expecting working life to ‘go back to normal’. For me, that won’t work.
Arcus Global Secures Spot on G-Cloud 11 Framework, for the Seventh Consecutive Year
All of Arcus Global’s products and services will be on offer across all three lots through the latest iteration of the G-Cloud framework 03, July 2019: Arcus Global Limited, a market leader in GovTech cloud solutions, is pleased to announce that it has gained a place on the new G-Cloud 11 framework, allowing it to… Read more »
Arcus and customers nominated for prestigious industry award – voting open now
Arcus Global and a select group of Arcus customers have been shortlisted for the Digital Leaders 100 List
How Meltdown & Spectre underline the benefits of being on the Cloud
The Meltdown & Spectre CPU vulnerabilities will force all security-conscious organisations to patch their servers. This is something that has already been completed by AWS. While the speed of reaction to threats like these is a good reason to host your infrastructure on the Cloud, this issue also highlights another Cloud benefit which is that this change will result in a 5 – 30% reduction in server performance which can be easily fixed in a Cloud environment but is really hard to handle on premise.
Let’s whisper this. Is digital always best?
We’re drowning in social demographical profiles about smartphones, tablets and 4G showing how to deal with citizens in the most cost effective channel. You can spend your whole career and budget chasing stats for websites, compliance for accounts, and quickest customer journeys.
4 Causes of Legacy Systems Syndrome and Some Ways to Mitigate Them
Does your organisation have a system, which while critical to some business function is proving nearly impossible to update and change? Does every upgrade cycle take months and require serious effort and testing? Is the application starting to creak at the seams and proving occasionally unstable?
Data Quality Is A Design Problem
Many organisations have data quality problems. Some organisations have data quality problems so serious it stops them from using key systems in a meaningful way. When that happens, sometimes the consultants get called.
The fallacy of “national” systems
Merging Service / creating a “national” Software / Platform for Local Government.There have been suggestions that some councils are just too small. You can see the whole discussion here: I thought I would pull out some of the points I have made in the discussion, as I thought they were worth sharing: In terms of… Read more »
Barriers to digital change in Local Government
The Department for Communities and Local Government recently conducted an extensive study into the use of digital technologies by those in Local Government. The report discovered that for 72.7% of authorities, legacy systems and infrastructure is the biggest barrier to developing their digital offerings. This statistic was echoed by the suppliers taking part in the… Read more »
Five reasons why Councils should be using the cloud
Having recently joined Arcus from a District Council, I can see very clearly the benefits that cloud computing, whether software or infrastructure, can have on most public sector organisations. Here are my top five reasons why councils should be looking to the cloud for their ICT future.1 ) Cost Every organisation is feeling the effect… Read more »
Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt over ICT jobs
There has been a recent survey highlighting the barriers to adoption of Cloud computing done by the Cloud Industry Forum (CIF). The survey was reported on publictechnology.net (can be found here) http://www.publictechnology.net/sector/central-gov/public-sector-cloud-booming-where-are-standards?goback=%2Egmp_2981638%2Egde_2981638_member_133502379 The survey comes up with all of the expected findings about growth, trajectories etc… One particular section is interesting (quote from the page… Read more »
So the G- cat is out of the bag!
Earlier this month, central government released the first iteration of the G-Cloud Framework. It is being wildly discussed on the partner networks, with lots of cloud providers planning to bid. Indeed, according to a Linked in post by Mark Craddock, it attracted something like 80 suppliers on the first day. This is hardly a surprise.… Read more »
The proliferation of layers in the Cloud and what to do about it
There’s an old adage in Computer Science, which goes: “There’s no problem, which cannot be solved by adding another layer of indirection.” One usually goes on to add: “Except, of course, for the problem of too many layers of indirection.” Truth is, layers are great. They have been intimately involved in almost all the great… Read more »
A bit like an iceberg…
When buying a car, apart from all the comfort and flexibility that it brings, we expect further expenses, beyond the initial list price of the vehicle. With expenses such as road tax, insurance, MOT tests, servicing and parking, the costs can soon build up, especially for car enthusiasts. This example is something many people can… Read more »
Do I Really Want One of Those?
When I was a kid I idolised another lad, he was so very cool. He could do that there robot dancing that was so very popular in the 80?s. He was called by his 2nd name rather than his Christian name (something I used for my own sprogs) and he had a Big Trak. Big… Read more »
New Commercial models emerging from the Cloud
As many people are no doubt aware, Cloud Computing is presenting a growing number of innovative commercial models. The next 2 posts will explore some of the ones that we have deployed with out clients
“individuality is likely to carry a high price tag”
(Many thanks to txay for permission to use this fantastic image) Wow! What a quote from Martin Read, taken from this article in publicTECHNOLOGY.NET. It reminded me of something I read on gigaom some while ago when they were looking at barriers to the take up of cloud based solutions. To put the quote into… Read more »
Outsourcing Debate part 2
There seems to be a debate about the current drive for cost reduction forcing some of the councils to consider outsourcing. Sure: you are promised same or better for less, and you don’t have to worry your pretty little head about a thing. Your headcount drops too, and you may even get a capital injection – if not now, then perhaps in a few years time.
Threat to ICT jobs
Many more organisations in the local government are starting their move to at least hybrid provision of services. The path is pretty well etched now: ICT organisational restructuring -> Policy and Capability review (including data analysis and separation) -> TCO analysis -> Pilots / Migrations -> Integration -> Support and Management. This post is focused… Read more »
Local Government Moving to the Cloud
As farfetched a vision this may seem, the change in attitude towards Cloud in local government over the last several months is astounding. Just 12 months ago, when we started going around local authorities offering free consulting on how to move their services to the emerging industry, we frequently were met with blank stares, or… Read more »
Cloud in Local Government – when is a good time to act?
During our many many visits to local authorities across the UK, there is one question that we get very frequently: When is the right time to start taking action regarding the cloud? Generally, every ICT and business professional within Local Government in the UK that I have met has acknowledged that Cloud computing, in its… Read more »
We have classified the Cloud Services – but what about its Customers in the Public Sector?
Roughly, I could split ICT professionals that we meet into 4 major categories based on their attitude to the cloud: Believer/adopter. They have made the mental leap to the new delivery model, including the cloud part of it. They accept that they need to deliver services, not software, and all that this entails. They are… Read more »
Cloud vs. Outsourcing in Public Sector
In many ways, Cloud Computing is closely related to a commercial concept of outsourcing: a 3rd party is providing key elements of IT service in an organisation. To an extent, some of the scepticism that exists around the Cloud Computing Industry is routed in this similarity. Many of the local authorities we are working with… Read more »
Evolution of the Cloud
Like Gas, Electricity or Water, Information Technology should be simple, ubiquitous, and cheap. Users / customers of the service should not enjoy or dislike using IT anymore that they do using the 220 volts of power from a socket. This is the key to Arcus’s methodology for advising and delivering cloud services to the public… Read more »