News

Covalent has published the 138 new National Indicators that have just been finalised by the Audit Commission following a consultation process. The exercise is done automatically for all Covalent customers as part of the annual support service. As soon as the remaining outstanding indicators are finalised by the Audit Commission Covalent will also add those to relevant customer sites

2007 represents our most successful year to date, with 30 new customers signing with Covalent bringing the total customer base to 98.

Within the councils market, Covalent is now the undisputed market leader with 77 customers of all sizes and types, compared to our nearest competitors 64 customers. Notable wins this year were Doncaster MBC, Middlesbrough, Hartlepool and Solihull. We secured a further 4 Scottish councils making Covalent the overwhelming choice and bringing our market share in that segment to over 35%. An interesting contract was also our first Australian customer, City of Salisbury in Adelaide. Covalent is also gathering momentum in other Public Sector markets, notably Housing Associations where we secured 5 new customers and the new NHS market.

There were four new releases of the Covalent CPM software suite that transform it into the leading solution in terms of functionality and usability. In addition to a host of new features and ongoing enhancements, we delivered the Web Publishing and Web Updates modules, Models to support self-assessments and GIS for mapping performance data geographically.

Covalent has won its first contract in Australia, with Salisbury City Council headquartered in Adelaide. This contract was won without ever meeting any Salisbury staff; demos were conducted over the Web and a number of teleconferences ironed out the details.

Recent Audit Commission reports on several Covalent customers have noted recognition from the inspectors of the Covalent solution and the way in which it is helping organisations across the UK to improve their corporate performance.

Hertsmere Borough Council, “The Council has robust arrangements for monitoring and managing performance. This is facilitated by a comprehensive performance management tool which collates all of the Council’s performance data, ensures it is verified and sorts it into presentation packages relevant to the different performance management groups. The performance data can be extrapolated and tailored to meet any particular requirements, such as trend analysis, and can be presented in a number of formats. All staff have readable access to the system, and briefing and training sessions have been held to embed and maximise its use.”

Rossendale Borough Council, Housing Inspection. Inspectors report “A web-based performance management system; ‘Covalent’ has been introduced. This has led to better quality and timely management information, alerting management to poor performance quicker than under previous systems. The system can be accessed from any computer and shows ‘at a glance’ through a traffic light system if performance is on or off target” … “The Council is making appropriate investment in IT systems and training to enable staff to make effective use of IT”… “The ‘Covalent’ performance management system is a further example of improved use of IT to assist in managing improvement”

Scottish Borders Council, The KPIs are monitored through the Covalent performance monitoring system….The performance monitoring system will monitor performance at all levels and by its launch at the end of June 2006, nearly 200 employees across the council had been trained to use it.”…“The council needs to consolidate the work it has started, to ensure that the arrangements it has put in place, some of which are very recent, become consistently embedded across all its operations. The council has in place a sound framework for scrutiny. These arrangements can become more effective by developing a more strategic focus, and should be better informed by the availability of good quality performance information, once the Covalent system is fully implemented.”

Winchester City Council, Housing Inspection. “This is an area where strengths outweigh weaknesses. The Council is investing in skills training for its staff and Members and has updated its human resource policies and procedures to support recruitment and retention and reduce sickness levels. It has also invested in a new performance management IT system and is working well with its partners to make the best use of available resources.”

Wychavon DC, the first customer to start using Covalent CPM in October 2003 has been nominated Council of the Year in the presitigious LGC annual awards. A number of other Covalent customers won category awards including the People Management award for Barking & Dagenham LBC.

This is the second year that the Council of the Year has been a Covalent customer, following West Lothian Council’s success last year, when it became the first Scottish council ever to win this award.

The following testimonials have recently been received from a number of customers

“We think Covalent’s fantastic! As a council we have in the past, and would in future, recommend Covalent to other potential users. It fits all of our performance management needs and the product is constantly developing and adapting in line with its market, so as a customer you experience consistent improvement in a product that was good to start with. For me, the one thing that makes Covalent products stand out is the value placed on the customer, and on customer feedback. Also, the willingness to adapt your product to user needs. Each customer is treated as individual and I think this is very important.”

Becky Midgley, Performance Officer, Ribble Valley Borough Council

“Covalent came top (by a long way in all aspects scored) [when we conducted a full tender selection process]. I can confidently report we are happy with what we have, Covalent has filled gaps we knew we had and some we did not know we have! If there is anything missing it is not major. Covalent has a list of developments which are shared with users and an active user group which is used to shape the Covalent future.”

Charlie Proctor, Dumfries & Galloway Council

“Covalent has really helped us to focus and put performance management at the heart of the organisation. It enables us to effectively measure and check that the Council’s priorities and objectives are being achieved”

Ceridwen Pettit, Head of Performance, East Herts District Council

“During the two years we’ve been using Covalent, there have been many improvements to our processes thanks to the system. Not only has it ensured consistency of definitions (should the DCLG decide yet again to make late changes) but Covalent has also added capacity within the Quality and Performance Unit. Mainstreaming Performance and Risk Management was never going to be a walk in the park, but it is certainly made easier with the use of Covalent.”

“Having previously been up to our necks in Excel spreadsheets, Covalent has simplified what used to be a painstaking cross referencing exercise each quarter. Reporting is now done at the click of a button, and with access at all levels (from Management Team, Elected Members and all other employees) transparent working is now the norm. Responsibility is now being taken seriously as you never know who’s next to log-on.”

Nik Moore, Quality and Performance, Rugby BC

“We purchased Covalent a year or so ago and I would score it 10 out of 10. It is an extremely good system and the company is very committed and customer focused”.

Alaine Clarke, Performance Improvement Manager , Uttlesford DC

In January 2007 Covalent Software started the New Year with 3 new customers!

In the Local Government market North Wiltshire District Council and Doncaster Metropolitan Borough Council have both chosen Covalent CPM as their Corporate Performance and Risk Management software solution.

Covalent are also pleased to announce another Further Education College customer, with Otley College joining a customer base of nearly 80 Public Sector Organisations.

Doncaster MBC will be working with Covalent’s in-house developers to produce GIS mapping facilities within Covalent, further enhancing the software in line with the needs of Local Government. In addition to the core Covalent CPM product, North Wilts have purchased the new Models Module available, which provides customers with a simple way of undertaking self assessments in line with a number of public sector specific performance management frameworks, such as CPA, Harder Test.

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Covalent has completed its third successive year of growth, with revenues for 2006 up 50% on last year. The number of customers using Covalent climbed to over 70 public sector bodies, with a total of 8450 named users registered on the system across all customers.

Comments Peter McHugh, CEO “2006 continued the pattern set since we founded Covalent in 2003, of strong and continuous growth. The year was particularly notable for the number of successes we had in new markets within the public sector, notably FE Colleges, Housing Associations and Charities. Councils remain our core market, where we consolidated our market leader position with a series of new contracts”

The recent Government White Paper mapped out a new Performance Framework for councils. Its aim is to reduce radically the number of nationally-required local targets, performance indicators and reporting and to replace these with new opportunities for citizens to hold their local providers to account for the quality of services
The new performance framework will

• Strengthen accountability to citizens and communities through increasing choice, encouraging authorities to provide citizens and communities with timely information on services, introducing more effective means of redress when things go wrong and increasing opportunities for communities to run local services and manage local facilities
• Provide a better balance between national and local priorities, with a drastic reduction in the number of national performance indicators.
• Put in place the following key elements:
  An annual risk assessment which identifies the key risks to outcomes or delivery for each area.
  An annual scored Use of Resources judgement for local public sector bodies, drawn from the annual audit.
  An annual scored Direction of Travel judgement which assesses the effectiveness of each local authority in driving continuous improvement.
  Inspection activity by relevant inspectorates targeted primarily on the basis of the risk assessment.

Reporting to Citizens

Meeting the duty to secure the participation of citizens will depend in large part on providing citizens with accurate, accessible and up to date information on service performance. Only with this information can local people effectively hold public service providers to account for their performance.

The PI set

At present there are between 600 and 1,200 indicators against which areas must report to central Government. Our aim is to reduce radically the number of these national indicators to around 200 against which all areas will report. This single set of indicators, which will draw from existing indicators where appropriate, will replace other sets of performance indicators applying to local authorities and the services they deliver in partnership with others – such as BVPIs, social care Performance Assessment Framework (PAF) indicators and other programme-specific indicators.
Wherever possible the national indicators will be outcome measures, with output or process measures used only where absolutely essential and where they are robust proxies or lead indicators. The aim will be to avoid input measures.
From April 2009, we will build on CPA with a system based on a combination of risk assessment, largely risk-triggered inspection, and audit. The new regime will be known as the Comprehensive Area Assessment (CAA).

Judgement on risks

The annual risk assessment of local services in each area will be undertaken jointly by the relevant public service inspectorates working together, led by the Audit Commission. They will draw on information from other regulators, government departments and Non-Departmental Public Bodies as necessary. A risk judgement will be drawn annually from the risk assessment and published for every area. We will ask the Audit Commission to work with the other inspectorates to develop and trial a methodology for undertaking this risk assessment, so that it is ready for full implementation from April 2009. This risk assessment will cover risks to delivery and the effectiveness of action taken by local partners in response to those risks.

Covalent has published its analysis of the results of the first annual health check for Hospital Trusts, published October 2006 by the Healthcare Commission. This analysis highlights marked variances between different trust types, with Acute and Specialist trusts performing the best across both quality of services and use of resources, and Ambulance Trusts the worst.

The results also highlight the importance of effective performance management within trusts, to consolidate results across the organisation and to manage the Self-Assessment process in a coherent manner.

See attached document for more details

Covalent analysis of Annual Health Check.doc