Many of you will know me as ‘ThatHousingITGuy’ from my blog (tonysmiththathousingitguy.blogspot.com), which has been running for almost as long as Housing Technology magazine, with over 500 posts. My experience in the housing sector spans almost 30 years working for suppliers as well as housing providers, so not much escapes me. Most of my work involves ‘procuring the right solution’, acting as a ‘critical friend’ and then helping to make it all work.
Supplier consolidation
One big theme across the sector over the past 15 years that I’ve noticed has been the consolidation of systems and suppliers. Not only has this has reduced choice, it has also caused frustration for some users because helpdesk knowledge gets watered down and suppliers can easily be labelled by their customers as unresponsive or just uninterested.
It’s therefore been no surprise, as often documented in my blog, that there has been an emergence of new solutions available on Microsoft Dynamics and other CRM platforms. However, although I’ve come across many housing providers using Dynamics, it’s rare to see it total displacing a traditional housing management system (available in both ‘classic’ and ‘legacy’ versions!).
Microsoft Dynamics
There are so many housing providers where Dynamics development has struggled to replace an HMS that might be almost 30 years-old, is still licenced for another 5-10 years and in full daily use.
In my view, Dynamics is definitely up to the job; perhaps the problem is ICT teams not being bold enough or budgets not large enough. Among the housing providers I’ve worked with, it’s not unusual for them to have taken stock, looked at their HMS situation and decided that going back to a modern, web-based HMS is a better and more cost-effective option.
Loving spreadsheets…
I’ve not noticed the love of spreadsheets by both end-users and senior management to have significantly dwindled, nor levels of training on Excel. This way of working still keeps islands of data outside housing providers’ primary systems of record, leading to difficulties around GDPR and accurate reporting.
Over the past 15 years, my blog has revisited many themes over the years, often covering technologies that are ‘just around the corner’, such as drones, augmented reality, Google Glass (remember that?) and, of course, the internet of things (IoT).
Internet of things
Disappointingly, IoT always seems to be on the cusp of wider adoption, despite no end of small-scale trials and regulators driving housing providers to further monitor and protect their properties and residents’ wellbeing. With hindsight, IoT might have saved lives at Grenfell Tower (as would have landlords and contractors not cutting corners) and possibly the life of Awaab Ishak in Rochdale. Again, are budgets holding back ‘real life’ deployment of these technologies or is it just a lack of boldness in our sector?
15 years on, we still see far too many media exposés on large housing providers (often the same ones) failing their residents regarding maintenance and repairs. I have a few hundred residents among my 16,000 housing-sector followers on X/Twitter and I probably help at least three each month with whatever useful advice I can give.
Helping residents
I recently published two articles on my blog, one to help residents complain to their housing provider in a structured way and another relating to systems for serving customers better. There is no shortage of solutions to help housing providers, although low respect for data, inconsistent processes and organisational cultures still let many organisations’ delivery down.
In my view, data is and has been a constant factor across our sector over the past couple of decades. We now have the best-ever data analysis tools, often coupled with huge, expensive teams to identify problems with our information.
However, without the right culture (and even with the best solutions), housing providers will still struggle to provide the right service to their residents and find it difficult to complete every interaction right first time.
Tony Smith is an independent housing IT consultant at Acutance Consulting and is the author and founder of the ThatHousingITGuy blog (tonysmiththathousingitguy.blogspot.com).
