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Welcome to the A-Z and FAQ/Knowledge Base Project

The underlying aim of this project is to help realise the Scottish Executive's MGF3 goal of answering 75% of citizen enquiries at first point of contact.

Over half of all Scottish local authorities are now using the outputs of the A-Z/KB project: a shared A-Z of services with a common services list and navigation structure, linked to a comprehensive knowledge base of FAQs and sample forms, which will help councils better deliver services to citizens. In order to facilitate this, The Improvement Service paid all Scottish Council's subscriptions to esd toolkit until the end of June 2007. This has now expired and in order to get best use out of the project outputs, this needs to be current. Don't forget to renew your council's subscription!

3rd Scottish TLC a huge success!

The 4th Scottish TLC was held at Falkirk on 31st October 2007. The agenda is here & the presentations are here

5th TLC to be held at Surgeon's Hall in Edinburgh on 28th May 2008. Register and see the agenda. 

 

End of project report available now !


  • PDF of screenshots from Falkirk Council's Internal ESD application
  • PDF graphical representation of an entity relationship diagram that shows all mappings between SSL, IPSV, SNL, LGAL, etc.
  • PDF that shows the linkages on a more granular and practical level, which has been contributed by Falkirk council
  • East Renfrewshire's Presentation on how they plan to re-develop their website and incorporate all strands of the A-Z project
  • Perth and Kinross user testing report after implementing the SNL at a local level
  • ESD Improving understanding: Applications for Scotland and the future presentation
  • How esd toolkit can assist councils in the Scottish agenda for transforming local governement presentation

    TLC 4 was held on31 October 2007 - chair, co-chair, regional liaison officer to be elected.


Project Outputs

The outputs of this project are, on the A-Z side:

  • a framework for the development of a common A-Z list (download the A-Z word or excel document) of Scottish council and other public services,
  • a Scottish Services List ( SSL version 3.01), which details all public-facing services that Scottish councils offer,


  • a user-friendly navigation structure, the Scottish Navigation list ( SNL ) which will help citizens find what they are looking for, and

    flowcharts that detail how to create a localised SSL, how to create a website from a localised SSL entry for an existing website, and how to create of a webpage structured from the SNL from data contained in the localised SSL

    mappings between the SNL and IPSV, SSL and 46 esd categories and various other useful mapping



On the knowledgebase side:

  • a database and categorisation of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) now available to logged-in users on esd toolkit. (There is also a pdf document that provides some guidelines on writing FAQs for your council's website/intranet and a pdf document that shows a template upon which to base your FAQs.) A case study showing how Renfrewshire Council implemented the FAQ data set on their website is also available to download as a pdf.
  • sample forms (which you can view under the forms/shared forms tab when viewing trees in esd toolkit)

See the resources page for case studies, templates, guidelines, training materials, event presentations, SNL/SSL mappings, and so on.

We have appointed a usability company to conduct Information Architecture and usability testing on the project outputs. This has been completed and a report outlining the results is expected soon. If you would like more information on this, please contact Tessa Darley .

The project officers for the project have visited 22 councils across Scotland. Details of these visits are on the engagement page .

Training on esd toolkit has been provided by Sheila Apicella and Deanna Sorrell. Presentations, including the one for the esd main administrator twilight session in November 2006, are available on the training page and the resources page.

The Scottish Toolkit Local Community (TLC) meets 4 times a year to discuss issues pertaining to the esd toolkit and its various components. The last meeting was on 31st October 2007 in Falkirk. To find out more about the TLCs, go to the Scottish TLC page .

The elements that constitute the outputs of the project are designed to be interdependent, however they can be used separately too. The frameworks developed by this project can be used by councils across Scotland to enhance interactions with citizens through a range of access channels as well as to support broader organisational change and improvement.


If you would like to know more about this initiative, particularly if you would like to get involved as the programme progresses or would like to advise us on relevant work already carried out in your own authority, please get in touch with  Martin Brown of the Improvement Service. We will be able to tell you more about this project, which we feel can make a real difference to how people view their local council.