Case Study: Noosa Shire Council

The Council saved millions in capital expenditure, depreciation and in-house IT staffing costs

Case study highlights

  • 3 million documents saved in ECM
  • Implemented in just 4 months
  • Saved millions of dollars in operating costs

The Challenge

Following its deamalgamation from Sunshine Coast Regional Council, the new Noosa Shire Council had four months to implement new software, with zero IT infrastructure or staff.

"The Sunshine Coast Council was using best of breed systems, but we felt that an enterprise solution was more appropriate for us," Director Planning & Infrastructure Martin Drydale said.

"We also knew we were going to have less in-house technical specialists to rely on for things like integration or system enhancements. We considered the cost of building a data centre and maintaining it all, and decided a cloud-based system was the most practical option."

The Solution

Noosa Shire Council implemented TechnologyOne's OneCouncil solution on the TechnologyOne Cloud in less than four months. TechnologyOne runs its own enterprise software for its customers through the TechnologyOne Cloud, taking complete responsibility for providing a simple, cost effective and elastic model of computing.

OneCouncil is a preconfigured, enterprise solution, integrating all operations from land and property management, finance and regulatory functions through to payroll and HR.

The Outcome

By implementing its enterprise software on the cloud, the council has saved millions of dollars in capital expenditure, depreciation and in-house IT staffing costs.

The preconfigured approach also enabled Council to reduce implementation time, cost and risk, with similar council implementations typically taking 12 - 18 months.

"Having TechnologyOne run and support the infrastructure and software means that accountability lies solely with them. Any issues are resolved very quickly, and so far we have had 100 per cent up time of the software," Mr Drydale said.

"This has freed up our operational IT team to focus on driving new functionality, rather than just maintaining infrastructure."

Director Planning & Infrastructure
Noosa Shire Council

We considered the cost of building a data centre and maintaining it all, and decided a cloud-based system was the most practical option.

Perspective

Noosa Shire Council formed on 1 January 2014, after residents elected to de-amalgamate from Sunshine Coast Regional Council. The council implemented TechnologyOne's OneCouncil solution on the cloud in just four months, saving millions of dollars when compared with an on premise solution.

The enterprise software as a service initial investment is worth $1.2 million in licensing and services, and $1 million per annum thereafter. Estimates guided by a KPMG cost analysis put the capital expenditure on a similar IT solution to be approximately $5 million with an annual operating cost of $3.6 million.

"TechnologyOne was already a major supplier to Sunshine Coast, so we knew staff coming over would be familiar with the look and feel of the software," said Director Planning & Infrastructure Martin Drydale said.

"When compared with other ERP systems, we felt that TechnologyOne offered a more integrated and comprehensive solution than the other providers we evaluated."

Mr Drydale said TechnologyOne's solution delivered everything it needed, and the council has enjoyed 100 per cent up time since going live.

"Since launch, the system has continued to perform fantastically. It is robust and highly available, and we've never had downtime of the TechnologyOne applications.

"Through working with TechnologyOne, we have access to a range of experts and resources at our fingertips. Whether it be database resources or Property & Rating experts, there's a diversity of expertise that we only pay for as we consume."

The council's CEO Brett de Chastel added: "It is difficult enough to run a council without worrying about ageing servers, downtime and disaster recovery. None of this is our core business, so it makes perfect sense to outsource all of that to an expert while the council gets on with serving the Noosa Community.

"This total solution and embedded business processes has enabled us to remove a huge amount of complexity from the transfer processes, prepare ourselves for the future and save millions of dollars."

Spotlight

As part of OneCouncil, Noosa Council implemented Enterprise Content Management (ECM), enabling it to capture, store, use and manage information contained within its business documents from any device, anywhere and any time.

The implementation involved migrating 2.4 million ECM documents and metadata from Sunshine Coast Regional Council related to Noosa properties, customers and projects. Since going live, Council has increased this to 3 million documents and growing.

"ECM's Connected Content feature has been the real success story so far, and is supporting our push for ECM to become the sole document repository for Council," ICT Manager Justin Thomas said.

"Connected Content automatically registers documents added in OneCouncil, creates and updates the indexes, and handles editing and versioning - all without the user even knowing they are using a document management system."

"It's a real game changer. The automation has saved our staff a lot of time and significantly improved our record keeping."

About Noosa Shire Council

Noosa Shire Council formed on 1 January 2014, after residents elected to de-amalgamate from Sunshine Coast Regional Council. The Shire of Noosa is located in the Sunshine Coast region of South East Queensland, and has a population of approximately 51,962 across its land area of 868.7 square kilometres.

Noosa Shire Council website

Publish date

24 Apr 2015

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