Introduction
The City government of Denver Colorado is one of the County governments which have the interest of providing quality services to its subjects. Having a population of over half a million people, the county government of Denver in an effort to improve the quality of its services to its people, migrated to a system management system that is administered by the ALFRESCO Company. The government is responsible for 140 schools, the Denver Airport, libraries, fire stations and many other public amenities. The quality of management and service delivery was poor until mayor John Hickenlooper spearheaded for changes in the IT system within this county. This paper, therefore, looks at how the county government of Denver, Colorado has changed, and the benefits that these changes came along with to the dwellers of Denver.
How the Management Changed
The efforts of mayor Hickenlooper ensured the creation of a centralized group of IT with integrated strategies to streamline and create unity in the Information and Communication Technology department of this county. The county government migrated to a new system and document management system popularly known as Alfresco’s; it is an open source web based system enterprise content manager (ECM). The mayor did away with the 14 the initial 14 systems which were used to manage communication within this count (). The Alfresco systems came along with several changes, for example, it could support multiple languages and clients at the same time; there also emerged new methods of document management improved to a better system of management and record documentation. The graphical user interface of the new system became integrated with suits from Microsoft so that its management and access become easy. In the financial department, the office of the auditor got fixed with software for finance management as well as an automation contract requisition process. Changes were also made in the procurement department as its structure was improved as well as the general process of procurement. The engagement of citizens with the government agencies also changed into an online engagement procedure. The 311 emergency number used to connect citizens to Citizen Service Centers were improved for the benefit of all citizens in a time of emergency.
Benefits
Document sharing became easy. Initially, there were up to 14 government agencies in operation that could not communicate with ease with each other, thereby, increasing efficiency in the management of documents as well as communication. Security of the documents improved, and this ensured that all confidential information and documents held by the county governments were free from hackers and other criminal activities. Verification of documents and records improved and this in turn improved the productivity of workers who initially were low in productivity due to the low moral as a result of much time being wasted in search and verification of important employee documents (). The scanability of important documents became easier, as a result. The removal of the fourteen communication systems that were used in the county was a cost effective, measurable in the county because it reduced the amount of finance that was injected in document management. It is estimated that the new system of content management would save the county government of Denver up to $ 1.5 Million in its operational costs. It would also reduce the recurring cost of licensing by up to $ 1 million. Through the new ECM, employees are also able to search through the documents easily and faster after the implementation. Another benefit of the new system was that there was no more interruption to service delivery that was common with the old system. The aforementioned changes improved the entire phase of life of the people of Denver County.
Reference
Alfresco.(2014). City and County of Denver.Retrieved 23 March 2014. From,
https://www.alfresco.com/customers/city-county-denver.
Miller, G. (2011). Denver’s Winning Strategy: Open Spurce, Alfresco and Zia Consulting.
Retrieved 23 March 2014.
