Integrative document management in local government: A case study in IT innovation

A City Council administration in Victoria, Australia developed a vision for a Corporate Information Management Strategy (CIMS), and envisaged that CIMS would provide the foundation for the organization to make better use of its knowledge. This would be achieved by implementing better management controls over its information assets and by enabling staff to search and retrieve relevant information within its overall business context, without having to resort to time-consuming manual processes. This strategy embraces an integrative approach involving the development and implementation of information and document management policies, principles, practices, information systems and technology with the view to: Securing the Council's information assets; helping the Council to exploit its knowledge capability through a well structured, shared, self managed and well used information management environment, and enabling authorised staff to locate relevant information quickly, with the assurance that they are accessing the correct information. The Council envisaged that CIMS would provide the foundation for the organisation's development as a knowledge organisation, by implementing better management controls over its information assets and by enabling staff to search and retrieve relevant information quickly within its overall business context, without having to resort to time-consuming manual processes. The Customer Request Tracking System (CRTS) project is the first in a program of projects designed to help the Council achieve its overall vision for CIMS. This case study reviews the CRTS project, which is Phase 1 of CIMS, and evaluates the effectiveness of its implementation.