Issue - meetings

Digital technology is rapidly changing our society, it is changing how we communicate, how we consume services, how we buy and sell things, how we learn and how we manage our lives. It is not about a technology, it’s about delivering a joined-up customer experience, it is about meeting customer expectations, it’s about transforming how we work, and it is about ensuring we have the right connectivity in place.

The council has made some good progress with delivering digital services and this strategy builds on this work, it has been developed to ensure a coordinated and progressive approach and provides a common understanding of what we want to achieve and how moving forward.

The Cabinet

RECOMMEND TO FULL COUNCIL – That

1. The Digital Strategy be adopted; and

2. The Group Head of Corporate Support be given delegated authority to make any necessary consequential changes to the Digital Strategy as a result of new legislation or alternative working practices.

The Cabinet Member for Technical Services, Councillor Stanley, introduced the Council’s 5-Year Digital Strategy and emphasised that the Strategy was about meeting customer expectation and ensuring that the Council was connected to its customers.  This involved the need to build services that would be as good as others used by customers elsewhere whilst at the same time making the Council’s digital services a preferred choice.  The Council’s 5-year digital strategy set out the Council’s vision, aspirations and direction.

            The Head of Technology and Digital then worked through the key highlights of the Strategy stating that it had been based on consumer analytical and market trends and that work had also been undertaken with Customer Services to best understand customer practices and needs. 

The Cabinet welcomed this report accepting that the pace of change in digital capability meant that the Council needed to constantly ensure that it could offer different ways for customers to access its services.  It was the Council’s role to deliver excellent digital services that were able to support and influence consumer demand whilst at the same time recognising that some groups would not be able to use such services.  The Council therefore needed to continue to provide services in a way they could still access them. 

The Cabinet

            RECOMMEND TO FULL COUNCIL – That

(1)          The Digital Strategy is adopted; and 

(2)          The Group Head of Corporate Support is given delegated authority to make any necessary consequential changes to the Digital Strategy as a result of new legislation or alternative working practices.

The Cabinet supported the recommendations in the report and then confirmed its decision as per Decision Notice C/020/091219, a copy of which is attached to the signed copy of the Minutes.

(During the course of the discussion on this item, Councillor Dr Walsh declared a Personal Interest as a Member of West Sussex County Council).