In late 2020, Logan City Council invited QSA to participate in a Design Sprint to develop a range of possible options for the upgrade and/or potential replacement of the Council’s existing records and document management software solution – DM.
Our role was to partner with Logan City Council in the Design Sprint, forming part of the working group to provide legislative and records management advice and insight into emerging and modern records management. This working group consisted of representatives from across Logan City Council and QSA.
Logan City Council’s DM system was implemented in March 2000 and the Council recognised that their DM system has become outdated, unable to support the strategic goals of the business. A roadmap was established by LCC to prepare for a possible DM replacement.
The Design Sprint was the next phase of their roadmap. The aim of the Design Sprint was to validate the current state of records management within the Council, and to ideate possible solutions that would align with the needs of managing documents and records in a digital age.
The Design Sprint took place in mid-December and consisted of three main stages:
- Problem framing – framing the problem from an organisational perspective through the development of a problem statement, vision statement, persona canvases, customer journey mapping and assumption mapping
- Discovery – undertaking market research and trend analysis; carrying out a range of interviews with end users across the Council; experts; industry; and seeking advice from internal mentors
- Ideation – development and exploration of idea concepts.
The intensive Design Sprint process resulted in the development of a range of concept solutions for Logan City Council to consider. It resulted in options that may not have otherwise been considered through traditional workshops or through limited consultation and engagement activities. We won’t spoil the results and take the glory, we’ll let Logan City Council share their journey and discoveries!
Council weren’t the only ones to get something out of this sprint either. We found several benefits from being involved in the process, both from the perspective of QSA but also to the outcome of the Design Sprint itself, including:
- the ability to bust myths in real time e.g. that an eDRMS is needed to ensure compliance with the Public Records Act 2002, and records management is about a software solution
- being able to assist with interpretation of terminology and other key issues e.g. definitional issues regarding documents, records, information, data and public records, and how they are managed
- providing interpretation of legislation and QSA policy advice
- providing advice about best practice records and information management, including national and international trends
- the potential to use findings from the Design Sprint to inform current QSA projects
- gaining a better understand how agencies interpret and implement QSA advice, and valuable insights into the strategic and operational management of a Queensland public authority – their challenges and opportunities
- synergies and alignment with the findings from QSAs reimagining recordkeeping initiatives.
A further outcome of the workshop was a realisation for QSA itself. As mentioned in our other comms channels we are undergoing a transformation journey throughout 2021. This journey is seeking to change the approach we take in regards to recordkeeping, away from a focus on compliance to a mindset of collaboration.
So, if you have a project that we can work with you on please get in touch.
We would also like to thank Logan City Council for inviting us to be part of their Design Sprint and to share some our findings from this involvement. We wish them all the best for their DM replacement journey!