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IT Service Management
How a One-Stop-Shop IT Platform Can Transform Your Council Service Desk
16 Oct 2024
Service Desk teams at councils manage a wide range of tasks, from handling Freedom of Information (FOI) requests to rolling out major IT infrastructure upgrades. Managing all these projects in multiple systems, endless spreadsheets, and juggling tasks can feel overwhelming. That’s where a one-stop-shop platform come in! A one-stop-shop platform centralises everything in one hub. You can manage tickets, handle FOI requests, and oversee complex IT projects - all from one place.
While traditional service desk software for councils focuses on ticket management, Sunrise’s solution for councils streamlines processes and helping you efficiently manage everything from internal IT projects to responding to public enquiries.
How council service desks can manage more than just tickets:
- FOI requests: Tracking and managing Freedom of Information requests can often feel like trying to herd cats. Instead of losing track of deadlines or manually logging each query, you can integrate FOI request management into your service desk software. With this, all incoming requests are automatically logged, tracked, and categorised.
- Managing IT projects: Upgrading infrastructure or rolling out new systems can be a hassle when using separate tools or endless spreadsheets. Sunrise simplifies this by allowing you to manage IT projects—assign tasks, track milestones, and allocate resources—all within the service desk. If your council uses other project management tools, Sunrise can integrate, keeping everything connected and efficient for smoother project execution.
- Public requests: While many councils have specialised systems for handling public requests, not all have dedicated platforms for every need. The good news is that Sunrise can adapt to your council's unique requirements. For example, if you needed to log and track parking ticket queries, Sunrise’s flexibility would allow you to manage these requests efficiently.
Integration: bringing everything under one roof
For council service desk teams, the real value of a one-stop-shop platform lies in its ability to integrate with the IT systems you use daily. This ensures seamless workflows across your department, reducing the need to juggle multiple tools or manually update different systems.
For example:
- Asset Management Systems: Automatically track and manage council-owned hardware and software, ensuring compliance and reducing downtime.
- Configuration Management Databases (CMDBs): Get real-time insights into IT infrastructure changes, improving incident response times. Discover how Sunrise can help you maintain your CMDB here.
The possibilities are endless when your systems talk to each other!
Why should councils replace spreadsheets with a modern service desk platform?
If your current solution to tracking tasks or managing projects involves endless Excel sheets, you’re not alone. Many councils rely heavily on spreadsheets as a low-tech way of managing data. But here’s the thing - spreadsheets can be a nightmare for tracking multiple queries, projects, and tickets. They require manual updates, can be easily lost or corrupted, and aren’t great for collaboration.
The Sunrise platform is a perfect spreadsheet replacer, offering real-time updates, automation, and built-in collaboration tools. Imagine being able to assign tasks, track project progress, and respond to tickets, all without the hassle of juggling multiple spreadsheets!
Real-Life Impact: Success Stories
Councils are already transforming their service desks with the Sunrise platform. For example, Tendring Council successfully brought its IT service desk back in-house, using Sunrise to manage services for over 750 staff and councillors. Judy Barker, IT Services Manager, shared: “We’ve been using Sunrise for nearly three years, without any failures, giving us reassurance and allowing us to focus on supporting the work of the council, its staff and councillors.”
By centralising their IT services, Tendring streamlined processes and supported larger transformation projects, showing how effective a one-stop-shop platform can be for councils. Read the full success story.
How a one-stop-shop platform can transform your council
Here’s how transforming your service desk can lead to improving efficiency in councils:
- Efficiency boost: With everything from ticketing to project management in one place, teams spend less time searching for information and more time solving problems.
- Collaboration: Integrating IT systems within your council service desk fosters better collaboration across your team, making it easier for your IT team to share information and solve problems faster.
- Automation: A modern service desk like Sunrise can automate repetitive tasks, allowing council IT teams to focus on bigger issues.
- Scalability: Whether your council is managing small internal queries or massive infrastructure projects, your service desk can scale accordingly.
What’s next? Get started today!
The beauty of using a one-stop-shop platform for councils is its flexibility. You don’t need to overhaul your entire IT infrastructure overnight. Start by integrating a few systems and gradually transform the way your council operates. The goal is to create a centralised hub where tasks, tickets, and queries are managed efficiently.
With Sunrise, councils can turn their service desk into a powerful engine for change, helping teams to stay organised, meet deadlines, and ultimately, provide better services for the public. By moving to a one-stop-shop service desk platform, councils can say goodbye to fragmented systems and spreadsheets, and hello to improved efficiency, seamless integration, and the ability to manage both internal and public requests with ease.
So, why wait? Start transforming your council service desk today! Take a look at how Sunrise can help public sector organisations streamline their service desks.
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