The problem
Are you a head of technology, digital lead or service director in a council?
Somewhere in your organisation this week, a statutory document that takes hours to write is standing between a meeting and an action.
In Barking and Dagenham, an Education, Health and Care Plan took four to five hours to draft. Similar documents took several hours each, often delaying cases by weeks.
What they did
Its Continuous Innovation Team built a tool called BD Notes in-house, working with frontline teams in Children's and Adults' Services. One developer and a product owner.
Staff upload a transcript, document or recording, choose a template matched to the statutory process, and receive a draft to review, edit and export.
What was reported
The council is exploring the tool across 13 service areas, and early analysis suggests thousands of officer hours could be released each year. That is an early estimate, not a measured total.
Where people stay in control
Officer decisions
Every draft is reviewed and edited before use. Officers keep full control of the final document.
Design choices
Templates matched to each statutory process, built with the frontline teams who use them.
Lessons for other councils
- Start with one document. Pick a recurring statutory document and time how long it takes today.
- Co-design with the people who write it. The council's own lesson was to augment, not replace.
- Weigh build against buy honestly. A small in-house team can work. So can a product. The right answer depends on your data, skills and support capacity.
- Keep the officer accountable. Review points are a design requirement, not an afterthought.
Our view
The tool is not the hero of this story. The template, the review step and the frontline team that shaped them are.