I am a consummate optimist and in today’s current market, optimists are an endangered species. In my fifteen years of working with state and local government in delivering software solutions that increase productivity, now more than ever, government is being forced to make some tough decisions and I am ecstatic for the future of government.
Judicial and public safety agencies are cutting back employees and being forced to exhibit private sector behavior; and I am excited to witness the change.
Before the posts start flooding in on how the services offered by government and running more like a business are conflicting principals, or critics to the brutally honest nature of this message, or the argument about the negative aspects of the private sector (the banking industry? Bernie Madoff? AIG?), just hear me out.
I am obviously biased in my recommendation that introducing technology to government can reduce long term cost, reduce personnel, and even increase revenue; but government moving towards business principles is a good thing.
For those opponents that believe that government moving toward private sector principals will lead to a path of corporate greed, I simply cite that the overwhelming majority of small and medium private companies that our economy is based upon are like New Dawn Technologies; ethical and make up the framework of our economy. They reinvest back into their overall operations, retain employees based on performance and are not providing grossly inflated executive compensation packages.
Ask my wife about our grossly inflated executive compensation package, I am sure that she will agree that we have to budget like everyone else, have no access to a private corporate jet and the greatest testament… has anyone seen my commuter car that I drive every day to work?
Without mentioning the specific customer, I was asked, “How quickly can we implement JustWare, because we are going to start letting employees go?”
The customer is implementing arrest filing interfaces that would eliminate all manual data entry. Data entry currently manually performed will now be completed with an electronic interface and data entry errors will be eliminated. In the past with a project like this, those employees would be shifted to different responsibilities, now they face the possibility of losing their jobs. They also justified the purchase of JustWare because it was less expensive than paying in-house development staff to re-write their mainframe software program. What is wrong with this picture? I say nothing.
The harsh reality is that technology and innovation is good for government in reducing expense, reducing payroll dollars, reducing benefits and retirement costs. Kiosks are replacing airline employees, same principle. Although using the airlines as the pinnacle of innovation and a model of capitalism isn’t the best example, another post on that later.
SaaS (software as a service) is quickly becoming a mechanism for the private sector to reduce hardware and software costs. It is eliminating the requirement to have additional IT resources to manage software. Sounds great right?
JustWare, New Dawn’s flagship case management software solution is not only available as an on-premise solution (installed on local servers) it is now available as a SaaS solution. This allows criminal justice agencies to eliminate the need for additional servers, eliminates database software purchases and even reduces resources that manage the infrastructure. However, nine times out of ten, JustWare is being installed on local servers for the following reasons (and yes, I am paraphrasing);
1. “Although I conduct my personal banking online, I don’t trust technology or the Internet to securely store case information, so I would prefer that our case data is stored on our local servers that are located in an unventilated closet, that sporadically gets backed up, and by the way, numerous and potentially unknown employees have the server password. Yes, I am really paraphrasing, and no offense to the vast majority of government IT departments who don’t operate in this environment; there are however those criminal justice agencies that operate as described.”
2. “I can’t have you maintain my server, what will my IT resources do?”
The private sector is rapidly adopting SaaS in comparison to government. In time, government will follow, but now is the opportune time for SaaS in government to reduce expense.
During the post 9/11 economic slowdown, one of New Dawn’s customers commented that because staff was being let go due to county budget cutbacks, there was no way that they could operate with the same level of service without technology; specifically JustWare. This is good for government, and ultimately the economy.
Small business and technology companies have to closely watch the bottom line, keep payroll dollars in-check and drive revenue and profitability upward; now government is being forced to follow the same model.
I have provided just a few of many examples of how technology in government reduces the expense side of the income statement, what about the revenue side?
I recently was onsite at a prospect demonstration and the decision maker was asking a series of questions regarding the company, how long we have been in business, company stability, and how many employees we had and then the administrator asked a question I had never been asked. “What is your budget?”
“What is New Dawn’s budget?” I replied. I was actually speechless, and didn’t know how to initially answer.
I quickly realized that the administrator has never had to think about how much money they are bringing into the office, they have always just spent money. So his equivalent to total sales, revenue, or net income is his budget.
No fault to the administrator, they have an annual budget of what they can spend and that is what they do, they spend, they don’t earn. They do provide a valuable service, but don’t charge for any of the services provided. They have always looked at one side of the accounting equation, and the revenue side is likely handled at the very top of the county.
A wave in government is occurring where revenue mechanisms are being implemented with solutions provided by vendors like New Dawn. The San Antonio Municipal Court charges private attorneys for FTP access to moving violation records. The court has valuable data worth purchasing by private attorneys, who then cold-call those cited to provide legal services. It is a win-win scenario, and allows the court to act more like a business.
New Dawn’s JustWare and JusticeWeb solutions provide revenue enhancement capabilities for criminal justice agencies allowing online web payments that charge an additional convenience fee to the payee. This allows payments to occur online rather than at a cashier window. Other solutions charge credit card fees to attorneys for access to e-discovery via the web instead of paper or discs that traditionally would be picked up in person. Other revenue tools include participant fees for diversion, integrated accounting solutions that allow fees to be allocated directly to the hot-check diversion division, or court technology fees for each offender citation.
All of these technical innovations put more money in the pockets of the justice agencies, at the expense of the offender or the interested party. What is wrong with that? Again, I say nothing. It is all about convenience and saving time, both guiding principles of capitalism and innovation.
So with some innovative shifts in governmental thinking, technology infusion, and smart administrative navigation through this slowdown I look forward to answering questions such as “What was your EBITDA in 2012?” from future decision makers with a smile.
– See more at: http://newdawn.com/2009/03/29/government-incorporated-is-now-the-time/#sthash.iyyF9BUu.dpuf
veryance. 