Microsoft Dynamics CRM for Regional Councils

Louise Alderton, 23 April 2011

Regional Councils and Government organisations are constantly in the public eye and face high expectations. While you want to improve your delivery of service and engagement with people there is also the challenge to be more efficient and accountable. Today, Regional Councils face several challenges – the need for connectivity with other government agencies, managing multiple projects, trying to do more with less, the demand to be more sustainable, and complying with regulations, all while trying to better serve your citizens. Without the right systems in place to collect and share information, coordination of functions and monitoring it is difficult for Regional Councils to fulfil all of these expectations.

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Regional authorities are primarily responsible for environmental management. This includes water, contaminant discharge and coastal management; river and lake management including flood and drainage control; regional land management; regional transport, including public transport; and harbours, biosecurity or pest management.

Microsoft offers a tailored local government solution with their Citizen Service Platform (CSP), Dynamics CRM and SharePoint applications. Component-based and rapidly configurable, CSP can support common technology and process foundations across agencies, helping Regional Councils deliver high-quality, highly efficient services to citizens across their Region.

Let’s take a look at some of the specific features and benefits a Microsoft Dynamics CRM Regional Council Solution, with the help of the CSP offers:

360-Degree View/Project Management
With a Microsoft Dynamics CRM solution you are able to achieve a complete 360-degree view of not only your citizens but every aspect of your organisation from projects and planning to staff collaboration and public communication. This solution provides a central, easily accessible hub for all information. You can maintain a clear picture of each current project while providing your staff consistent, relevant and timely information to assist them in their day-to-day responsibilities.

Consistency and Cost Efficiencies
With Microsoft Dynamics CRM’s workflow and automation functionality you can standardise and streamline many administrative processes. These might include complaint management, claims processing, incident reporting, economic development initiatives, voter registration, and benefits management. Automating these processes creates huge efficiencies and freeing up resources to be used on more important tasks.

Easy Analytics and Reporting
Built in analytics, dashboards and reporting in Microsoft Dynamics CRM can improve regulation compliance and help you to identify trends for more informed and proactive decision-making. All of which make for more effective management of resources and greater efficiencies.

Environmental Sustainability
Microsoft Dynamics CRM CSP solutions address the distinct security and privacy concerns of government organisations, while providing tight integration, collaboration and meeting environmental sustainability goals. Efficiency through automation of administrative processes gets things off paper and the cloud model eliminates the need for power-chewing physical servers and infrastructure.

An Agile Platform for the Future
The Microsoft Citizen Services Platform is industry-specific and adaptable. This gives you the ability to leverage the platform to build solutions which address the changing needs of government organisations cost-effectively. This cuts development and support costs, while ensuring seamless integration.

Let’s take a look at a couple of real-world examples of a Microsoft Dynamics CRM Regional Council solution in action:

Biscay County Authority

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Biscay County Authority oversees governmental administration for the historical territory of Bizkaia (Biscay), one of Spain’s most prosperous areas. To maintain its economic advantage and improve quality of life for its 1.2 million citizens, the County Authority wanted to create a program to improve delivery of citizen services in the 112 municipalities that make up the county.

The Biscay County Authority partnered with Microsoft to develop the ‘BiscayTIK’ Project, a Microsoft Citizen Service Platform–based initiative that provides free-of-charge email service to the entire population of Biscay, supplies each town hall employee with modern, integrated management applications, and operates a web portal that citizens can use to complete more than 100 of the most-requested services.

Some of the benefits of BiscayTIK are that it has brought local government and citizens closer together, improved the quality of services provided by the government, and enhanced operational efficiencies across municipalities. Because services can now be delivered more cost-effectively, BiscayTIK estimates that local governments have reduced costs by 50 per cent, and improved efficiency by 33 per cent per transaction. It is also estimated that—because of energy-efficient systems management, fewer citizens traveling to town halls, and reduced paper use by employees—they have reduced carbon dioxide emissions by more than 1,000 tons a year.
Read the full case study

Câmara Municipal de Abrantes

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Câmara Municipal de Abrantes is located in the centre of Portugal and delivers public services to a population of more than 42,000. This Regional Council wanted to improve its citizens’ quality of life and make Abrantes more competitive at the national and regional levels through the innovative use of technology. The municipality chose to deploy Microsoft Dynamics CRM to help reach its goals.

The average number of visits for a service request has been reduced, and the municipality has cut the average time it takes to process a citizen transaction by 50 per cent. Council employees are working more productively with a single information system that integrates customer information from all its line-of-business applications. Most of Portugal’s 300 city halls still deal with citizen requests manually, but Abrantes is an exception. The solution is now being extended to nine other local authorities, which will share the same Web-based data centre as Abrantes council.
Read the full case study

*1 Image from: http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/government-and-nation/8/1/3
*2 Image from: http://www.microsoft.com/casestudies/Case_Study_Detail.aspx?casestudyid=4000006015
*3 Image from: http://www.cistus.pt/website/index.php?module=pagemaster&PAGE_user_op=view_page&PAGE_id=6&MMN_position=6:6