::case studies::

Founded in October 2021, JPW Digital Services Ltd is a small but dynamic Transformation Consultancy.

Digital Transformation for two Borough Councils

Involved at a senior level devising C-Suite ICT strategic recommendations for two large Councils regarding their business areas, concentrating on identifying potential savings, and efficiencies and determining effective business solutions (M365, SaaS, IaaS, and PaaS operating models). Also led the Microsoft 365 Adoption Programme, promoting it within departments, demonstrating best practice use of the solution. The programme was adopted by Directors and used throughout both Councils to ensure a collaborative governed way of working was delivered.

Applications Rationalisation and Digital Roadmap

Led and delivered a remote project for a District Council, who, over an estimated 15-20 years, had underinvested in their ICT (Information and Communications Technology) infrastructure and solutions. Their applications were primarily on-premise and the support and maintenance for them, especially the key applications, had either expired or the knowledge was locked into one person – no information sharing had been undertaken. Moving forward, the Council wanted to take advantage of cloud solutions, to make future savings, but also to minimise risk regarding support and maintenance. It would also provide the Council with the ability to use solutions from any device (if connected to the Internet).

Using Agile methodology, I led a discovery exercise to understand what applications they had now (as-is), considering the technical architecture and the business outcomes needed in the future. Once this was understood, we researched the market for relevant cloud solutions (to be) that could be used. The result was a five year, fully costed digital roadmap, which gave the Council scope for investment.

Programme and Project Office Review

For a large District Council, as part of a transformational exercise which was delivered for the Council’s Finance Directorate, I led an exercise (with a team) of reviewing their Programme and Project Team’s (ICT and Corporate) Project Governance and how they were delivering their projects. The initial discovery indicated no set methodology/governance was being adhered to and projects were being extremely reactive, instead of being proactive and delivering solutions which benefited the organisation and its residents.

We began by providing the Programme and Project Team with best-practice advice, presenting workshops on agile and waterfall project methodology/governance. James and the internal Programme Lead decided that the culture and way the Council was run, a waterfall methodology was the best solution for how programmes and projects should be governed. The team were well versed in PRINCE2 thus no immediate training needs were identified but future aspirations for MSP (Managing Successful Programmes) qualifications should be budgeted for. Also, as part of the delivery, a methodology pack was given to the authority, which was a set of programme and project templates that could be used for providing structure and strong project delivery.

Project Management of a Housing Application for a District Council

Parachuted into project managing a Housing application implementation for a Council, which, over two-and-a-half years, had failed to meet its outcomes. I implemented a full review, interviewing key stakeholders to understand where the project had been unsuccessful. After the review, I made recommendations to the Project Sponsor which were fully adopted. This included a detailed and prioritised delivery plan. Internal resource was not available and thus I sourced third parties to undertake project critical roles to ensure the project was delivered to a redefined budget and timetable.