My Paloma

If you do the Twitter thing, follow me at @HousingITguy
or LinkedIn here https://uk.linkedin.com/in/tonysmiththathousingitguy



It was sad to hear last month, of the death of Thomas Schweizer, director of Paloma based in Brighton, who supply housing solutions to a lot of mainly smaller social housing landlords.

I met Thomas on a few occasions, including at a NHF IT Managers conference at Olympia in November 2010. We were on a panel of suppliers together with Martyn Rees of an IBS recently bought up by Capita and John Doughty (anyone remember him from Orchard?).

Thomas was trying to do something differently for the sector, maybe a little quirkily and hands-on, but with his heart in the right place I guess. I have worked with a few Paloma sites, often to look at or assist in migrating Wrapp, Jamm etc, to more integrated alternatives. I understand that a couple of key support staff have also been lost too, over the past year.

Lack of adequate succession planning is becoming a growing issue with software houses, as life and old age catches up with the original innovators from the 1980’s & 90’s. There is no real excuse for lack of succession planning, especially where a few dozen social enterprises depend on continued support of software products. I would guess that quite a number of long time and larger Paloma customers (Worthing Homes & Swansea spring to mind), are already starting to research options. While there is probably urgency to ensure a stable housing system is in place, some structured examination of the market would as ever be recommended.

Like with any organisation experiencing changes like that, losing key staff, some reorganisation or targeted recruitment must be now necessary. I have worked with a few suppliers in a similar situation, with credible product and existing customers, as Critical Friend, to help navigate options forward.

Its fair to say that some other supplier organisations are currently going through transition too, based on the LinkedIn movements I see from my own extensive contacts across the sector. A number still need to put the breaks on the often revolving door of staff changes. Older and more experienced staff are indeed retiring or cutting down to three days a week. Recruiting good staff, training them to be even better with product and letting them develop can be a tough call. Cracking that and having an eye on sensible succession planning too, can make all the difference between satisfied and unhappy software customers.

Related Post: Do less locking of horns over integration - Get your software suppliers collaborating together

Catch the blog monthly archive at https://soundcloud.com/housingitguy/

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I would be pleased to connect with you on LinkedIn - http://uk.linkedin.com/in/tonysmiththathousingitguy Message me with any issues or queries, you would like to be explored in this blog. We generally receive a couple of suggestions each month.

The Knack - My Sharona.
(c) Tony Smith, Acutance Consulting www.acutanceconsulting.co.uk 07854-655009


Access a quick list of our Social Housing ICT blog posts here

Could we help you or your organisation? Our contact details are here , get in touch we will be pleased to chat about your problems and help with your organisation issues.

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. . . . . . . . . . .

Brighton Rock

If you do the Twitter thing, follow me at @HousingITguy or LinkedIn here https://uk.linkedin.com/in/tonysmiththathousingitguy


Oh to be beside the seaside!

I did just that last week, with a trip to Brighton, along to the Kirona DRS conference. It’s been a few decades since I was last down there, but it does seem to have reached ‘peak beard’, just based on the clientele at the ‘Brighton Beer Dispensary’, where I met up with an old housing chum from down the road in Worthing, for a few scoops. 

Anyone who has worked with me, knows I am a bid advocate for getting involved in user groups, taking the opportunity to participate, shape products and get closer to those back-room folks who write the software applications, that solve our problems, but occasionally make us tear our hair out too!

In a very enjoyable couple of days, when I learned a lot, David Todd again seemed to bring the sunshine with him and kept all attendees engaged and interested throughout.

The DRS scheduler, some still refer to as Optitime, is found with a vast mix of applications, different contractor as well as mobile systems. So this conference is a very diverse and interesting one, always with interesting people to meet, running all sorts of applications in Social Housing. I came away having learned as much about upgrades to other housing systems and which suppliers seem to be the most irritating at present, as well as of course, where the Kirona roadmap will take us.

A big aspect of the sessions this time, besides some free Kirona rock (nice touch!), was self-service and an awareness of digital strategies for socialhousing. As you would expect, self-service appointments were a key topic that came up. It’s been a while coming, while supermarkets have been setting expectations for us. A two hour appointment with Asda or the chance of a one hour one with Sainsbury’s. In relation to that, an all day appointment, which is great for the DLO, but not so good for the modern resident juggling two jobs and childcare.

I have seen no end of charts telling me a face to face costs £10, a call centre interaction £5.50 and a web self-serve just pence. That only holds true if we are managing hundreds of those web self-serve transactions every day. Otherwise that will cost you nearer £2.50 a go. Maybe rewarding our residents who ‘do it online’ might help with persuading them it’s a better idea than hanging on the telephone for 5 – 10 minutes. If we provided carrots like better appointment slots online, we would not need to consider sticks, such as extended waiting times, to beat our customers with.

We shouldn’t be beating our customers up, we should be offering them a number of ways to interact with us, that suit them. If we get it right, we won’t need to have a special digital strategy, just thinking ‘Digital First’ will become our natural instinct. 


Related Post: Do we aim high enough with our web self-service? 

Catch the blog monthly archive at https://soundcloud.com/housingitguy/

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I would be pleased to connect with you on LinkedIn - http://uk.linkedin.com/in/tonysmiththathousingitguy Message me with any issues or queries, you would like to be explored in this blog. We generally receive a couple of suggestions each month.

Queen – Brighton Rock.
(c) Tony Smith, Acutance Consulting www.acutanceconsulting.co.uk 07854-655009


Access a quick list of our Social Housing ICT blog posts here

Could we help you or your organisation? Our contact details are here , get in touch we will be pleased to chat about your problems and help with your organisation issues.
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