Pull together a room full of tech specialists, from across the public and private sector, and a surprising theme emerges. T hate technology. That is my dilemma every day of the week.' There is a surprising level of consensus in the room when the declaration is made. We are at the London headquarters of recruitment firm Penna for a round table on digital and IT. T have a slight fear that the movie Terminator is not a film at all but a documentary from the future,' one debater quips. Another declares himself a 'technophobe' rather than a 'technologist' - he is less interested in IT for the sake of it, and more interested in what it can do for people. It is the crux of the issue for everyone round the table. Local government - along with everyone else - is facing the fast pace of digital change and often struggles to keep up. You need to be 'agile and adaptive', and you need to accept there is no 'finite' investment in a tech system that will tick all the boxes so you can move on to something else. It is evolving, 'a journey with no destination'. In contrast, one debater suggests that when they started in local government they would create a short-term plan, a medium-term plan and a long-term plan. 'With austerity, we are looking one year ahead at most.' 'We need to work in a digital, agile universe, but instead we are still working in a Victorian way,' one of our guests opines. He cites the example of the London underground. We use the creaking historical infrastructure when 'we should have a 21st century metro system'.
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