Continuing to engage with you
We’re continuing to meet with you to understand your GovCMS experience, what’s impacting you and explore what’s on the horizon. Thank you to those who have been involved in the interviews so far and given their time.
In April, we met with another five PaaS agencies and discussed their plans leading up to the end of their GovCMS subscriptions. It gave them an opportunity to explore their options and ask questions to help plan their next steps. The agencies appreciated the contact and it highlighted the importance of starting to plan early. Overall, people were satisfied with the GovCMS service and support provided though there is definitely room for us to improve.
Some of their challenges included:
- Understanding the migration process and steps involved
- Time and resources
- Allocating enough time for the migration or procurement process and to engage internal stakeholders
- Understanding the impact on resources with a small team and redevelopment requirements
- Capacity to upskill developers for migration
- Moving sites to D8
- If they move to SaaS how could it meet their plans to expand online services
- Most agencies were not aware of or did not use the online community
- Timely responses to requests
- Better communication on key changes
- Needing more support documentation
One of the key insights from these conversations is that people want to be more involved. We have been exploring ways to increase our collaboration with you. We started the Mad Hatters Tea Party in May as an opportunity to connect weekly while working remotely. For the past few months we have also been engaging with agencies on the new GovCMS website, the Drupal Service Panel arrangements and the online GovCMS community. We will continue to look for other opportunities to collaborate and understand your requirements.
Another key insight from these meetings was the importance of talking with GovCMS at the start of their journey - early in the discovery phase and prior to procurement. Some of the agencies felt this engagement would have helped them to make better informed decisions and minimise the challenges they faced.
What’s next?
We’re working with these agencies to support their next steps. We will use their feedback to improve our services and keep you informed of changes we make.
From May, Glenn Martin and Annette Selwood will be meeting with SaaS agencies to understand their experience and plans. If you are interested in meeting with us early in this phase of our engagement please contact Annette by using our Contact Us form.