Talking 5 with Local Public Services Member 4C Strategies
Each month, techUK's Associate Director for Local Public Services, Georgina Maratheftis, interviews a member active in the local government space about their vision for the future of local public services and where digital can make a real difference to people and society. This month we talk with Gareth Johns, Managing Consultant at 4C Strategies, about the role that digital plays in transforming public services, through AI and automation.
Welcome Gareth. Firstly, tell me more about you, your career and how you got to this position today?
Hello Georgina and thank you for the opportunity to share my thoughts with the community.
I’ve been an active technology/digital consultant for over 20 years, working in an independent capacity and being able to act as a trusted advisor. I’m now at 4C Strategies, a leading independent consultancy in the public sector, as a Managing Consultant.
During that time, Public Sector has been a key focus for me, with Local Government (LG) at the core … possibly influenced by the fact that my first consulting engagement was with a local authority that had progressive leadership within IT.
Working with IT gives you an incredible insight into the functions that are provided by the sector. Though personally I’ve found that as I’ve progressed through ‘life’ I experience some of the functions in more detail, for example, interacting with the planning department, using the libraries for children’s books, engaging with education when applying for school places, and for additional support. There interactions provide an insight into the challenges that LG is under and areas where you can see that technology can/could assist more that it currently is.
It's these potential opportunities that keep me energised and enthused for working with the sector.
What is the greatest opportunity for local government when it comes to digital?
I think it’s important to acknowledge that LG has been ‘doing Digital’ for many years, it’s not a new thing. What I do think has changed though, is the opportunity for more insightful analysis using data that has been accrued. And yes, this is where the power of AI could be deployed across those data sets and across the wide spectrum of LG services.
Aligned with this, and it could be argued that it’s the same ‘family’, is automation. Most authorities are already using automation in some capacity and the confluence of more available data with AI insights can help with a greater use of automation, with the objective of improved efficiency and freeing up resources, people and tech, to focus in other areas.
At a practical level, 4C are working with LG on these opportunities today, ensuring best value for the public purse and potential ‘spend-to-save’ initiatives are scrutinised to guarantee those returns. It’s really simple to just implement CoPilot for example, but is this the right technology choice and what are the longer term implications, especially when public facing services are being impacted/removed.
On an optimistic note, I know there are pockets where this is occurring, we need to encourage this and make it the norm, not the exception.
What is your vision for the future of local public services and places?
There’s a risk in answering this question of it turning into a utopian vision and completely disconnected from reality. Though indulging that position for the moment, I don’t think I’m alone in wanting our public services to be sufficiently funded so they can support the local community to the level that we’d wish. Ensuring support is there throughout the stages of our life and that support is readily available where and when needed.
Now, indulging in this vision for a little longer, LG cannot provide this in isolation, it needs agencies to be joined up so they can focus on their respective specialist areas, for example NHS support within Adult Social care.
Technology and more specifically, data, can enable this through robust and practical data sharing agreements, commonality of platforms/data exchange and automation to drive efficiencies in processing when dealing with complex/multi-party cases. As discussed previously, AI should also be able to assist with deeper analysis and recommendations for practitioners to review when making decisions.
LG is in a unique position in that it doesn’t have ‘competitors’ for services, so sharing of approaches/learning/best practice should continue to be promoted and supported for the greater good of society.
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