Whangārei District Council reimagines citizen engagement with TechnologyOne’s DxP Local Government

Whangārei District Council is taking the next step in its digital transformation with TechnologyOne’s Digital Experience Platform for Local Government (DxP LG).

As the largest district council in Northland, Whangārei has a strong record of innovation — becoming the first in New Zealand to move to Software as a Service (SaaS) in 2017 and now one of the first to adopt DxP LG.

This latest initiative strengthens Whangārei’s long-standing partnership with TechnologyOne and sets a new benchmark for customer experience in local government.

Customer story highlights

• One of the first New Zealand councils to adopt TechnologyOne’s DxP LG
• A single, real-time source of truth accessible on any device, anywhere, at any time.
• Measurable improvements in efficiency, communication and customer satisfaction

About Whangārei District Council

Whangārei District Council serves more than 100,000 residents across 2,700km2 in Northland, New Zealand. Serving a mix of urban and rural communities, the council delivers local services including infrastructure, planning, and environmental management.

The district is New Zealand’s seventh largest by population and balance sheet, with a vision to create a vibrant and thriving region for its people. Guided by this goal, Whangārei has earned a reputation for leadership in digital innovation and operational excellence.

The challenge: creating a customer-centred council

Despite already having an award-winning website, Whangārei District Council recognised that its online experience didn’t give residents the full picture of their relationship with Council.

The site worked well for transactions, but couldn’t deliver the single, real-time view of services the community expected.

“When we looked hard at how we presented ourselves to customers, we realised we were showing them our view of the world, not theirs,” said Alan Adcock, General Manager Corporate at Whangārei District Council.

“They want to see their relationship with us through their own eyes, and the way we were organised didn’t allow that.”

Internally, staff managed multiple knowledge bases for customer service and communications, which often led to duplication and inconsistent updates. Residents sometimes had to contact different teams for information, and staff didn’t have a single, accurate source to draw from.

Paul Dixon, Applications Architect at Whangārei District Council, said the limitations of even an award-winning site helped drive change.

“Our website was excellent, but it wasn’t delivering what residents needed. “Since 2015, our focus has been to give residents a single source of truth — and we’d struggled to find the right way to deliver that,” he said.

For Whangārei, the next stage of transformation meant rethinking how digital tools could connect people, data and services across the council.

The solution: a unified digital experience with DxP LG

Whangārei District Council saw the opportunity to take a major step forward by adopting TechnologyOne’s Digital Experience Platform for Local Government (DxP LG). The decision aligned with the council’s long-term 'holy grail’ of creating a single, real-time source of truth accessible anywhere, on any device.

According to Mr Adcock, seeing DxP LG demonstrated at TechnologyOne’s Showcase event in 2023 was the ‘lightbulb moment’ that confirmed it was the way forward.

“DxP LG is a natural progression towards our vision...It lets us move from council-led to customer-led conversations, where residents see their relationship with us through their own eyes,” he said.

“Convincing staff to move beyond an award-winning site was tough, but everyone was united on the bigger goal.

“You don’t get the light bulb by improving the candle. We needed a step change, not a tweak.”

A TechnologyOne customer since 2006, Whangārei has continually embraced innovation to better serve its community.

It did so again by becoming an early adopter of DxP LG – one of the first to do so in New Zealand.

As part of TechnologyOne’s Early Adopter Program, the council helped shape new capabilities such as Knowledge Migration Services and Property & Rating search — both now core features of DxP LG.

Mr Dixon said that the partnership deepened Council’s already long-standing relationship with TechnologyOne.

“We’d rather be part of building the solution with TechnologyOne than giving feedback after the fact,” he said.

“We then get a voice into the future of TechnologyOne, its roadmap, and being heard by the development team and product owners is really valuable.”

The results: empowered staff and more simplified services

Since implementing DxP LG, Whangārei District Council has already seen measurable improvements in efficiency, communication, and customer satisfaction.

“Our Customer Services team immediately saw the benefit of using DxP,” said Mr Dixon.

Although it’s still early days, they now access accurate information instantly, responding faster and engaging more effectively with the community.

“Being able to have a quick search of property and rating whilst also having the knowledge base was hugely beneficial. Within three months, we’ll have all our duplicate data resolved — a project we’d been trying to push for years.”

Managers are also saving time with the DxP app, approving tasks on mobile devices instead of waiting to log in at their desks.

“We can’t stop the potholes forming or the dogs barking, but we can deal with them quicker and let people know we’re managing them — that will help strengthen our relationship with the community,” Mr Adcock said.

Whangārei and TechnologyOne have built a foundation that simplifies work and improves transparency for residents.

Looking ahead: on the road to continuous transformation

Whangārei District Council’s transformation journey is far from over. The council continues to roll out new DxP LG features through steady, incremental progress.

Mr Adcock told TechnologyOne that the key to a lasting digital transformation is to bring people along the journey from the very beginning.

“The key is to sell the ‘why’ first. People embrace change when they understand the problem we’re solving,” he said.

“Perfect doesn’t exist — transformation is a bumpy road. Working with TechnologyOne has been a partnership that’s stood the test of time. It’s like a marriage — ups and downs, but we’re in it together.

“Focus on the end goal and keep taking people with you.”

Likewise, Mr Dixon said that transformation succeeds when it’s driven by the people closest to the community.

“Digital transformation can’t be an IT project — it has to be led by the people who manage the customer relationship,” he said.

“The partnership with TechnologyOne helps us deliver more value, not just spend more money.”