Welcome to our second INLOGOV alumni e-magazine. INLOGOV has a long history of innovation, improving local services and supporting local democracy. We aim to bring current issues and practice to our research to impact positively on policy and practice.
Introduction from the Head of Department
Digital Transformation in Local Services
Welcome to our second alumni e-magazine, which focusses on digital transformation in local services. As government warms up the arguments for another period of austerity, councils increasingly face the twin challenges of limited funding and increasing demand. Always up for innovation, they are developing new ways of using technology to deliver more cost-effective services and enable council staff and elected members to work in new ways, increasing engagement and productivity and reducing costs. But what are the implications of this change for the relationships between services, users and citizens? And how can we maximise the chance of creating effective and lasting change, rather than a series of costly and ineffective white elephants?
In this edition we talk with the winning team of our DA Digital Design Challenge, who designed an AI solution architecture incorporating a virtual assistant for a digitally-enabled housing service in 48 hours. We share summaries of three recent dissertations which provide new insights on improving digital adoption, governing citywide data analytics, and remote onboarding of new staff. And we introduce Dr Timea Nochta, Assistant Professor at INLOGOV, whose research focuses on urban policy and multi-actor governance for digitalisation and decarbonisation.
Jason Lowther - Director, INLOGOV