for Local Governments

52
ICT for Local Governments
Standards, principles and best practices
� Well-managed and functioning ICT systems will build ground for growth of the
financial stability of the municipality. This will give a clear message to the voters
of the community about positive changes and stability.
The ICT strategy of the municipality should be clearly documented and should be based
on rules and regulations. Concerning ICT, a set of basic documents has to be created
over time (see Table 10).
Table 10: ICT strategy documents
Document Priority
Rules of use of the ICT system 1
Web content management rules 1
Hardware assets management rules 1
Software assets management rules 1
ICT action plan (2-3 years) 1
ICT budget (current year + forecast for 2 years) 1
ICT strategic plan for municipality (for 5 years) 2
Rules for starting, running and implementation ICT projects 2
Document management rules (adding Digital document management rules) 2
Rules to create backup copies 2
Data protection policy 1
3.2 Action Plan for Implementation of ICT
Annual action plans contain more concrete project descriptions where several more
concrete aspects are defined in parallel with the strategic aims. Usually, these are specific
aims of the project, expected timeframe, responsible persons or organizations,
general methods to proceed with the project, predicted budget and human resource
needs and main deliverables. Action plans are normally prepared by the CIO and approved
by the ICT Council. In small municipalities, where CIO and Board do not exist,
the plans are prepared by an ICT advisor and approved by the head of municipality. ROI
and profitability are one aspect that is often under discussion when action plans are
prepared.
Action plans often include benchmarks to measure the success of development. These
benchmarks also include financial issues. The supervision of the planning process is the
duty of the top management of the municipality. This is in many cases accompanied
with financial and ICT auditing processes.