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Greenwich Community Directory

Contents:

  1. Timeline

This project seeks to develop a reusable directory of community services that makes it easier for residents to find community services, creates a more sustainable way to publish and update content connected to those services, and that is easy to adopt for other local authorities.

The team are working with their chosen partner, TPXimpact, to develop an easier-to-use version of Outpost, an open source directories tool which serves as the back-end to the directory, as well as exploring how they can connect this tool to their website, which uses LocalGov Drupal. Although the team have had some delays in moving the work forward, they’ve worked hard to make Outpost easier for other local authorities to adopt, including making improvements to the product itself and ensuring it’s compliant with Open Referral UK. They also created a proof-of-concept to demonstrate how Outpost could be integrated with LocalGov Drupal, which the team will be using for their front-end interface.

Alongside this work, the team has created a community around Outpost, which had its first meeting in January 2023. Going forward, the team will be sharing more information about how they have been designing their directory to support other local authorities to make improvements to their directories.

The team are aiming to wrap up their Beta in May 2023, and are continuing to engage other councils in their work. You can find out more on their project website or by watching their Show and Tells.

More information, including outputs and working-in-the-open activities, will be published on this page as the project progresses. In the meantime, you can read the project application, or check out the team’s Show and Tells to find out more.

Project details

Phase: Beta

Funding granted: £350,000

Duration: November 2021 - Present

Partners: Royal Borough of Greenwich, Essex County Council, Cumbria County Council, Local Gov Drupal

Project links

Project timeline

November 2021

The project is awarded £350,000 of funding through Round 5 of the Local Digital Fund to conduct a beta phase.

 

August 2022

The team kicks off their work with delivery partner, TPX, which will initially focus on prototyping the user journey of Adults and Older People.

Greenwich have begun to add greater detail to their delivery plan, including establishing regular sprints for both their in-house team and TPX. Their focus is improving the user experience of their Community Directory and the reusability of TPX’s Scout and Outpost products, making it easier for more councils to adopt and customise these.

The team have also created a microsite to share their previous and upcoming shows and tells with others in the community.

September 2022

The Royal Borough of Greenwich are looking for local authorities who want to join forces and build a reusable community directory product that better meets the needs of residents, service providers and staff.

Find out more in their latest blog post.

The project team is now prototyping the end-to-end journey for the adults section of the Community Directory. In the coming weeks, the team will also be working closely with an interaction designer to develop proof of concepts which will determine the feasibility of the project and the next steps to take.

October 2022

The project team has been re-visiting prototypes around ‘support for adults’ based on staff feedback and workshops completed internally. The aim is to finalise their prototype to test with residents in the coming weeks. The prototypes on ‘support for adults’ will first be shared at an event with Primary Care staff at the end of this week.

Another highlight for the team recently was that they were able to effectively refine their objectives for the current phase of work. The team is going to use their clear vision and objectives to review their delivery plan and implement timescales for the rest of this phase.

Conversations are continuing with a range of councils to form partnerships and many are interested in using Greenwich’s solution for their own community directories.

November 2022

The team have been working to finish the technical work on their proof of concept which will connect the Outpost backend structures with the LocalGov Drupal frontend for the directory. The team will deliver a Show and Tell later in November to share what they’ve been working on — keep an eye out for a date for this very soon!

The team have also continued positive conversations with other local authorities about adopting the Outpost tool as part of their community directories

January 2023

The team are continuing their work with TPXimpact, and have recently created a proof of concept to demonstrate how Outpost could be integrated with LocalGov Drupal, which the team will be using for their front-end interface. You can find out more by watching their latest Show and Tell.