Newcastle boosts sustainability with digital transformation

29 February, 2024 – Newcastle City Council has transitioned its manual, paper-based timesheets to an Employee Self Service solution by TechnologyOne, saving time, money and a significant amount of paper.

With approximately 1,200 staff members serving more than 170,000 residents, the council aims to improve livability, sustainability and economic diversity through digital transformation. Newcastle opted for TechnologyOne’s CiA platform, which removes the need for direct server connectivity so they could fully harness TechnologyOne’s Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) solution.

Alicia Lopez, Chief Information Officer at the City of Newcastle, said that one of the biggest benefits the council will see from its digital transformation is its environmental impact.

"We expect to save approximately 12 tonnes of paper a year by moving to automated Accounts Payable, equating to one billion litres of water saved,” she said.

Newcastle has a big focus on its sustainability, becoming one of the first local governments in New South Wales to make the switch to 100 per cent renewable electricity. Using TechnologyOne CiA aligns with the City’s sustainability goals and positions it at the forefront of innovative, smart city operations.

Before Newcastle started its digital transformation journey, it dealt with labour-intensive operations, paper-based reporting which was environmentally damaging and errors in its data entries, all because of its manual payroll systems.

"Staff were manually filling out timesheets, scanning them, and emailing them to payroll. Some even had to drive timesheets to various office locations. It was highly inconvenient," said David Clarke, Executive Director of Corporate Services at City of Newcastle.

The new system replaces paper-based timesheets with digitised versions, giving council team members back time in their days to deliver for Newcastle’s residents and visitors. That means more field workers available to meet work orders, more office workers to deliver pet registration, more traffic workers on the street to get transport moving.

“Now timesheets are all digital, about 80% of that manual repetitive data entry work will disappear and our team will be able to pivot to do more value-adding work,” Mr Clarke added.

“Historically, much of our reporting was manual. With TechnologyOne's CiA platform, we have immediate access to vital information, giving managers a real-time view of operational costs and enabling more accurate decision-making. We’re excited about the journey ahead,” he said.

Loretta Libke, local government expert at TechnologyOne said: “Our CiA platform sets our customers up for the future by allowing them to work seamlessly, anywhere, anytime, from any device. It’s all about giving our customers the ability to do their day-to-day tasks in one single intuitive interface.”

“City of Newcastle is constantly looking to the future to improve business efficiencies, enhance staff experience, promote sustainability, and build a more connected community, and we are so proud to be working with the city through its adoption of the CiA platform.”

The Council will continue its digital transformation by migrating additional TechnologyOne products to the CiA platform throughout 2023 and 2024.