Councils across the country struggle to create a single, clear view of their procurement and financial spend. This is often because data sits in multiple systems (ERP, p-cards, e-procurement, and others), and because authorities need to analyse tens of thousands of lines of financial transactions to get a full picture. This can make it difficult to identify areas for cost savings or service improvements, or to measure local spend, SME contributions, or sustainability. This was true in Teignbridge District Council, which has a shared procurement service with South Hams District Council and West Devon Borough Council, and the councils were failing to make the most of their procurement and spend data.
We partnered with Ignite Procurement - our partner for spend management and intelligence - to conduct a rapid spend data discovery to clean, analyse and enrich disparate financial data across the councils to build a clear picture to inform decisions. We analysed a wide range of factors, like categories of spend, supplier consolidation, opportunities for joining up across the council, levels of local spend, and GHG emissions associated with spend and contracts. We did this by cleaning raw data taken from the council financial systems, and enriching them with a wide range of different datasets within the Ignite platform.
We were able to help the councils to take their unstructured data, and turn it into powerful insights to inform decision-making. This includes:
Working with the Cambridge City Council (CCC) to build a clear, actionable digital transformation strategy to ultimately serve its communities
Working with DLUHC over a 3-year period to conduct a robust, research-driven evaluation of 60+ local government digitalisation programmes
Working with BEIS to enhance user engagement with digital services to drive its Climate Finance Accelerator (CFA) initiative
Partnering with the BEIS to design and establish an effective digital policy engagement system to propel the energy sector toward a Net Zero future
Employing a user-centred and design-driven approach to enhance the Crown Commercial Service’s guidance to public sector buyers
Employing mixed-methods user research to pave the way for a forward-looking eProcurement and data strategy for the Welsh Government
Partnering with the Crown Commercial Service to facilitate the enhancement of the Government-wide Procurement Spend Data Service
Supporting the Frontline Digitisation team in the NHS to design a programme of support for hospitals purchasing and implementing electronic patient records (EPRs)
Partnering with the Local Government Association (LGA) to build a practical, user-friendly guide to help local councils put digitalisation into practice
A practical resource for governments looking to rethink sustainable procurement
Developing learning materials to embed cyber resilience into local government supply chains
In 2020 PUBLIC worked with the London Office of Technology and Innovation (LOTI) to assess barriers preventing procurement collaboration between London boroughs.
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