I like IT managers. Not something you hear very often. Certainly not in any organisation I’ve ever worked in.
But, hot on the heels of their report about the potential benefits of social media, Socitm, the society for public sector IT managers, is now urging councils to make more use of their websites.
Their annual Better Connected survey of over 400 council websites shows that just 39 per cent of council websites gave enough information to answer visitors’ questions, while only 61 per cent could be relied upon to be up-to-date.
My new friends at Socitm also did some maths and worked out that the average cost of dealing with a resident’s query face-to-face was £8.23. This compared to £3.21 by phone, but just 39p online.
I’m not quite sure how they got those figures, but I don’t doubt there are massive efficiencies in dealing with people online where appropriate. And where it is appropriate it is often more convenient for the customer too. It’s win-win. But despite this, just four in ten of the websites Socitm surveyed allowed people to pay bills or fines online.
At a time when we’re all looking for ways to do more with less it’s crazy that ways of connecting with people that are so well established in other sectors they’re almost becoming passé are still not the norm in the public sector.
In addition to making common transactions possible online, another simple tactic is to monitor the most common queries received over the phone and make the answers prominent on the website.
Many organisations could also do more to promote their website on printed materials, and particularly on answerphone messages or when callers are on hold.
I don’t think there is any doubt that we need to grasp the opportunities of online channels to improve communications at the same time as driving efficiency. But I’m surprised that it is IT managers, rather than comms professionals, that seem to be leading the way.
Keynote speakers including NHS chief exec David Nicholson and Sian Jarvis, Department of Health comms director, reasserted the size of the problem. The NHS needs to find savings of around 15-20% once the current financial settlement ends in 18 months. And before that, the NHS needs to manage what looks set to be a very tricky winter. Swine flu and seasonal flu combined are expected to put severe pressure on services at the same time as pre-election politicking will place the NHS under a magnified – and often distorted – media microscope.
The ‘internet election’ begins
The election has been announced. A May 6 election has been expected for so long it hardly seems newsworthy. But the tightness in the polls and high number of floating voters means the outcome is far from certain. It promises to be a close and hard fought campaign.
However, there is no doubt that the digital media landscape is unrecognisable to what it was during the last general election. Civil servants and government communicators leafing through the election guidance issued by the Cabinet Office this afternoon might have noticed that the section on digital media is much changed since 2005.
The document, revised and re-issued at each election, sets out the appropriate conduct of government business to ensure impartiality during the campaign. Back in 2005, in a section simply titled ‘The Internet’ (how quaint!), it was advised that “webmasters must take particular care” because “official websites are a form of broadcasting… and will be closely monitored by the news media and the political parties”. It said that “Interactive functions such as discussion groups which allow the public posting of comment or debate should be suspended.”
How things have changed. In the 2010 guidance, the section on ‘Digital media’ covers websites, social networking and Twitter. Far from calling for interaction to be suspended, the guidance now recommends that official participation in social media is simply limited during the election campaign to operational (rather than policy) matters and signposting users to existing content.
Public servants whose jobs take them online will be wise to take care during the election campaign. I certainly don’t think this election is going to be won or lost in cyberspace, but social media is playing a part and politicians, the media and communicators are all finding themselves in new territory.
Take, for example, the Tories recent series of poster campaigns. No-one predicted how easily they would be spoofed and mocked; the sheer number of people with a little knowledge of Microsoft Paint and a little too much time on their hands; and the speed with which the spoofs would be circulating and being picked up by the mainstream media.
The latest Tory posters show they’ve learned from this and are working on ‘spoof-proofing’. A simple font on a plain background is far too easy for a spoofer to replace with their own witticisms. In the latest poster, by wrapping the words around the front of the boots in the image, the number of spoofers will be limited to those with the necessary software, design skills and inclination to replace them.
We’re all learning as we go along. We’re yet to see how the parties will respond to the inevitable gaffe posted on You Tube, or a video from the leader’s debates with an amusing alternative soundtrack dubbed over the top. The 6 O’clock news is still important, but controlling what they’ll be talking about on the 6 O’clock news isn’t so straightforward any more.
After so many years of ever-tightening media control by the political parties, it suddenly feels very different. It might not be pretty, but it’s going to be fascinating to watch it unfold over the next four weeks.