14th September 2020
By streamlining the councils’ Environmental Health processes allowed officers to respond faster and provide much-needed support for the reopening of the retail and hospitality sectors.
The power of data
The reopening of the retail and hospitality sectors identified new risks by the Councils' Environmental Health Officers (EHOs). They needed to act fast to speed up risk management process so their 240,000 citizens wouldn't be impacted.
Previously, data collection was a slow and manual process that relied on numerous excel spreadsheets. This caused issues with inaccurate, missing and duplicate data.
My advice would be to use one central system to handle data. Working from separate data created in excel is like an additional database. By using excel in parallel, your database work is increased and introduces unnecessary duplication.
Exporting data for specific analysis in excel isn’t an issue. However, having two sources of data leads to inaccuracies and increased workload.
The best way to get the most out of your software is to collaborate with your officers and tech specialists. Once stakeholders see what can be done they are no longer reliant on excel.”
John Murray, Senior Environmental Health Officer