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Essex County Council Website Redesign and Build

Case Study: Leading the Migration of Essex County Council’s Website to the Local Gov Drupal Accelerator

I was fortunate to lead the migration of Essex County Council’s website to the Local Gov Drupal (LGD) accelerator—a project particularly meaningful to me as Essex is my home county. This opportunity allowed me to leverage my expertise while contributing to a project that would directly impact the community I grew up in.

Role and Responsibilities

As the project lead, I headed a multidisciplinary team that included UX/UI designers, Drupal developers, accessibility specialists, and the client’s content team. My role was to oversee the delivery, ensuring all elements came together cohesively within the scope of the project.

We adopted Agile methodologies throughout the project, utilizing ceremonies such as sprint planning, stand-ups, and retrospectives. Our backlog was organized with detailed user stories and acceptance criteria, which helped keep the project on track and aligned with stakeholder expectations.

Discovery Phase

The Discovery phase focused on gathering crucial insights to guide the project. This included:

  • Conducting workshops with key stakeholders to understand their goals and challenges.

  • Carrying out requirements gathering to clarify the technical and functional needs.

  • Engaging with end users of the website to capture their pain points and expectations.

These activities laid the foundation for the Alpha phase, ensuring that the website would meet both the council’s and residents’ needs.

Alpha Phase: User-Centered Design

During the Alpha phase, we focused on refining the user experience (UX) to ensure it would be intuitive and easy to navigate for residents and council staff alike. This included:

  • Running usability testing sessions on designs and prototypes to validate our assumptions.

  • Collecting feedback from real users to fine-tune key features and enhance accessibility.

  • Iterating on the design based on feedback to ensure the best possible user experience.

Successful Delivery on Time and Budget

The migration to the LGD build was completed on time and within budget, which was a major achievement considering the complexity of the project. The success of the migration was not only celebrated by our internal team but also by Essex County Council, who regarded it as a major win.

Key Outcomes and Benefits

For Essex County Council:

  • Flexible and Intuitive Editing: The new CMS provided internal teams with an intuitive editing interface, making content management more efficient and accessible.

  • Shared Features Across Councils: The platform enabled Essex to leverage features developed by other councils, enhancing the overall functionality.

  • Streamlined Content Management: A consistent approach to content management was established across different council websites.

  • Community Add-Ons: The LGD build made use of a wide array of community-developed add-ons, enriching the site's capabilities.

  • Simplified Login: Integration with existing Essex County Council accounts allowed for simple, secure user logins.

For Essex Residents:

  • Accessibility Compliance: The new website met WCAG 2.1 AA accessibility standards, ensuring it was usable by all, including people with disabilities.

  • Improved User Experience: The site offered a more seamless, cohesive experience, making it easier for residents to access services and information.

  • Performance: The website was faster and more reliable, with significantly improved page load times and uptime.

Impact and Next Steps

The success of this project not only delivered tangible benefits to Essex County Council and its residents, but it also paved the way for similar projects with other councils. This included successful migrations with Colchester Council and Knowsley Council, further validating the scalability and effectiveness of the Local Gov Drupal accelerator.