SharePoint project helps RTÉ deliver efficiency and productivity benefits :: PublicTechnology.net :: e-Government & public sector IT news + job vacancies:

Kainos has successfully delivered a SharePoint-based document collaboration project for RTÉ, Ireland’s public service broadcaster. The solution automates the handling and management of RTÉ’s copy clearance process which ensures that all commercials aired on RTÉ Radio and Television services comply with a comprehensive set of applicable laws and codes and are of a standard acceptable to RTÉ.

The content of commercials broadcast by RTÉ is subject to increasing rules and regulations from the Broadcasting Commission of Ireland and influencing bodies such as the Advertising Standards Authority and the Office of Consumer Affairs.

These ever-increasing and comprehensive regulations took their toll on the performance and efficiency of the RTÉ Copy Clearance process. For some time RTÉ had relied on a combination of its email system coupled with an in-house database solution to manage this copy clearance process.

As the system struggled to meet the compliance needs and became increasingly time-consuming and resource-draining, the team led by IT Manager, Declan McKibben, set out to find an IT Services partner to deliver a system that would address the complex regulatory needs of the copy clearance process both now and in the future.

RTE defined its requirements and following a short public tender process, selected Kainos as its IT partner to deliver the new copy clearance system. Kainos, an independent IT consultancy specialising in information management and workflow solutions and services, recommended a solution based on Microsoft SharePoint.

“From the outset we liked the Kainos SharePoint proposal,” Declan explains. “Our department was already familiar with MS Exchange for email management so to use that as a building block, boosted by Microsoft SharePoint to alert new cases, meant we had minimal training and less resistance from users. Kainos was confident in its knowledge of SharePoint and the collaboration and workflows needed to ring-fence and automate the copy clearance process.”

The system went live within six months and as Declan recalls “It took off immediately.” RTÉ is already experiencing a raft of benefits from its SharePoint copy clearance solution including the ability to collaborate on new cases with ease, and to offer a quicker turn around time on decisions to ad agencies. As each new case is documented so thoroughly by the SharePoint system, searching for information relating to cases is much less time consuming and more rewarding for those working in the copy clearance department. Decisions (approvals, part approvals or rejections) can be communicated quicker and with greater consistency too. Meanwhile, the system is delivering such strong search and reporting visibility that staff can quickly locate copy clearance cases by keyword, advertiser or agency and detect precedents which was hitherto very difficult.

Declan is in little doubt that RTÉ will benefit enormously from gains in efficiency and compliance. “However an added measure of success is the adoption of the system by our staff and how well it has been received as it relieves routine administration and makes information collaboration easy to achieve,” he adds.