Lagan Honors North American Innovation Award Winners

ROCKVILLE, Md., Oct. 26 /PRNewswire/ -- Lagan, the global leader in government to citizen (G2C) technology, announced the finalists and winners of its first annual Lagan North American Innovation Awards at the fifth annual Lagan North American User Group in Toronto, ON. A total of four finalists --  the City of Boston for Citizens Connect, the City of Buffalo for 311, the City & County of San Francisco for 311 and the City of Toronto for 311 -- are recognized for innovation in deploying practical solutions designed to maximize investment in Lagan Local Government CRM and help deliver improved citizen outcomes.  

Evaluated by a panel of customer judges, the highly compelling submissions ranged from state to city and county implementations of Government Enterprise Case Management (ECM) and CRM solutions.  San Francisco 311 was named the gold winner with Boston Citizens Connect named silver finalist and first runner-up. The judges' decisions were based on the following criteria: scale of challenges faced and overcome, ability to replicate/share the project with other municipalities, benefits to both citizens and the municipality, and degree of innovation.

A pioneer in the use of social media and support for the Open 311 initiative, San Francisco 311 was named the winner of Lagan's Innovation Award for being at the forefront of leveraging its Lagan Local Government CRM platform to include the latest communications channels.  "The Mayor's forward thinking and support from our Department of Technology allows us to embrace a range of social media, Web 2.0 and Open Government initiatives," said Andy Maimoni, Deputy Director, San Francisco 311.  "We've really been able to enhance and streamline service delivery and do so cost-effectively, saving the city time and money."

Boston Citizens Connect was recognized as the silver finalist and first runner-up in recognition of its innovative use of mobile devices to engage citizens in the management of their cities and counties. "With the Citizens Connect iPhone app, citizens can submit service requests directly into our Lagan-powered CRM system anytime, anywhere," said Justin Holmes, Director of Constituent Engagement, Boston Citizens Connect. "The ability to include a photo, a description and the precise GPS location allows us to speed time to service delivery and facilitates proactive involvement by citizens in the physical state of their community."

In recognition of its sophisticated CitiStat accountability program, whereby department or division heads regularly report and review key performance metrics with a panel of senior administration officials, Buffalo 311 was named a finalist. "The metrics we gain from the Lagan system have proven invaluable as we deliver on the accountability and efficiency initiatives Mayor Byron Brown outlined when he came to office," said Oswaldo Mestre, Jr., Director, Division of Citizen Services, Office of the Mayor.

The fourth finalist, 311 Toronto, was hailed for its robust Lagan knowledge base -- the largest developed to date and includes extensive indexing, classifications and updating processes.  "With 75 percent of the anticipated 2.6 million inquiries relying directly on our knowledge base, it's critical that it function at the highest standard," said Neil Evans, Director, 311 Toronto.  "All 150 CSRs have access to accurate data at their fingertips presented in a consistent way, enabling us to achieve a first call resolution rate of 75 percent in our first year of operation."

"We were extremely gratified by the scope and quality of entries, demonstrating a high degree of dedication and creativity by our customers in the use of technology to enhance service delivery to their communities," said Des Speed, CEO of Lagan. "We thank our judges, congratulate all of our finalists and our winner, and look forward to making this an annual celebration of our customers' innovation in government-to-citizen communication."  

About Lagan

Lagan Technologies is the global leader in G2C (government to citizen) technology connecting government and citizens worldwide. It enables governments and citizens to communicate online, on the phone and on the move. With 150 public sector customers worldwide, Lagan helps local governments serve the everyday interests of more than 60 million citizens.

Lagan's solutions for CRM and Enterprise Case Management (ECM) have been designed to streamline the service delivery functions of government, enabling improved efficiency and more citizen-centric public services. Lagan ECM manages the interactions between citizens and government and provides full CRM support for a wide variety of government service delivery processes. Lagan's solutions have proven utility for state and local governments and offer a range of flexible delivery methods: on-premise, on-demand and hosted.

For more information about Lagan, please visit http://www.lagan.com/ and contact us at [email protected].  Keep up with industry news on Twitter at http://twitter.com/lagan_business.

SOURCE Lagan