The journey to an optimised SharePoint website

Nottingham Fire and Rescue Service have been left delighted after their engagement with risual, which has delivered them an optimised SharePoint website, providing them with much more flexibility and productivity.

Gavin Harris, Head of ICT, Nottingham Fire and Rescue Service, said: “The transformation of our website using Microsoft SharePoint technology is astonishing. We have migrated from an extremely corporate style to a friendlier and welcoming portal for engagement with our local communities. The professional guidance and support of risual throughout the project has enabled us to turn our vision of a new website into a reality in a very short space of time.”

Due to functionality problems, the website administrators struggled to keep the content up-to-date, with the lack of a clearly defined content lifecycle causing outdated content to appear on the website. The skillset to update and maintain this had been ‘lost over time’, therefore NFRS needed a new solution that they could manage internally.

NFRS have a clear strategy to use Microsoft technologies where appropriate and had already invested in software licenses.  Their IT department and Corporate Communications team wanted a solution that they could manage internally, easily update and support themselves using their existing skills and experience of working with Microsoft solutions.

From an aesthetic point of view, a SharePoint platform would allow the public to easily navigate throughout the site using imagery rather than texture buttons.

Helen Dooley, Service Project Manager, Nottingham Fire and Rescue Service, said: “We went through the full process of looking at a few other competitors but based on previous experience, we knew risual would be able to provide the solution in a timely manner and give us the support needed to maintain it.”

risual’s SharePoint consultants carried out several design workshops, engaging various key stakeholders from NFRS to gather requirements from both a technical and business perspective.

NFRS had looked at alternative solutions, including upgrading their previous system, but knew the skills were not available in house to maintain and manage it.  Instead they opted for a fresh start with a SharePoint platform which would empower them with much more accessibility and flexibility.

Helen Dooley, Service Project Manager, NFRS, said: “We wanted to ensure we were on a Microsoft platform, so SharePoint was the obvious answer and risual had all the skills to support us through that journey.”

NFRS are a small organisation with lots of departments; the new SharePoint website allows all departments within the organisation to add documentation to the platform, providing valuable and interesting information for the public rather than merely statutory data.

NFRS will continue their plan to build on the SharePoint platform, as in addition to the website, they are also deploying a SharePoint Intranet, SharePoint Extranet and SharePoint Collaboration and Document Management solutions, leveraging the maximum out of their license investment.

Helen Dooley, Service Project Manager, Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service, said: “From the process side it’s fantastic too; we all have access into the backend and with the ‘published docs’ facility, it’s giving us the ability to have our corporate media team purely proof-read before publishing whereas before they also had to write everything too – so it saves lots of time and effort.”

Richard Proud, Director, risual, said: “We have engaged with NFRS on a multitude of projects now and I’m very proud that each of them has proven to be a major success. The engagement process was smooth and our continued working partnership is testament to the great work we’ve been doing together. risual maintain their commitment to helping out critical public sector services in the UK and we’re delighted that NFRS are already reaping the benefits of an optimised SharePoint website.”

 


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