Intelligent Government

I have a confession to make. It’s not going to be pretty, but stay with me—there’s a good story at the end.

OK, I’m a bit of an Internet geek. I often find that in my spare time I go to Internet forums on different topics to have some dialogue with random people from around the world. My favorite forum is one that’s focuses on “working out,” but they don’t call it working out—they call it training, hence the name of the website “Training Anarchy.”

It’s about to get uglier—I keep a training log on this website. All my workouts for the last three years are recorded for all of these random people to see and to comment. Go ahead and poke fun! My wife sure does!

Now to the story: Within this forum there’s a section called “The Network”—think of it like a coffee shop. There are threads on topics that cover just about everything. Some people even use it as kind of a journal for themselves—talking about everything from home renovation projects to how they got out of shopping with their wives to the stupid things their teenage kids do. By now, you’re asking yourself: “What does this have to do with government?” Well, one of these network members had an interesting post recently.

The title of the post was “Municipal Pet Peeves…” This caught my eye, considering my line of work is focused on the public sector. When I clicked on the thread, there was a picture of palm trees with dead fronds. These palm trees haven’t been trimmed for years. Enter Infor Hansen Mobile 311 for citizens.

What’s interesting about this situation is that the blogger has already completed all the steps it takes to log this in our Infor Hansen Mobile 311 application. He was at the location and took a picture, and all he’d have to do then is “submit” it using his smartphone. He’s already using the app without following through.

That’s not the end of the story. A few weeks later, he posted an update in the same thread. Luckily, a windstorm came that had 60 mph gusts and took care of all the dead fronds. As my fifth-grade grade teacher would ask, “What’s the moral of the story?” The moral: Don’t wait for a windstorm. Be proactive and check out what Infor Hansen Mobile 311 can do with this exciting new technology from Blue Dot Solutions. Help your citizens help you. Chances are, your citizens will be happy.

Do your citizens have the functionality to be proactive? I'd like to hear your plans for adding mobility to your agency. Please leave a comment to this post with your thoughts.

Posted by Jim Galon, Account Representative, Infor Government Markets