The Royal College of Midwives
Who are the Royal College of Midwives?
The Royal College of Midwives (RCM) is the UK’s only trade union and professional organisation led by midwives for midwives, with the vast majority of the midwifery profession being members.
RCM promotes midwifery, quality maternity services and professional standards, and supports and represents members individually and collectively in all four UK countries, influencing policy and opinion on behalf of members and for the interests of the women and families for which they care. The organisation prides itself on operating with integrity, to act in open and transparent ways, to be accessible to members and to support equity in service. The RCM has its head office in London with specific UK country offices in England (Leeds), Scotland (Edinburgh), Wales (Cardiff) and Northern Ireland (Belfast) that provide support for members in the respective UK countries. Because of the geographically dispersed nature of its organisation and members, the RCM relies upon its remote-access IT systems for both its critical and day-to- day operations. To safeguard this, the organisation turned to IT specialist ramsac to audit its IT systems and to provide on-going support and development for its mission- critical facilities.
Missing out on cutting-edge IT solutions
Director of Business Services at the Royal College of Midwives, Chris Truman, commented, “We had a previous IT support supplier but felt that we weren’t having access to cutting-edge IT solutions that match the dynamic ways in which we interact with our members and staff. We had witnessed a ramsac presentation on IT provision at an event and were impressed by the company’s ability to provide bespoke, business-led IT strategy and support for clients, so we asked the team to conduct an IT Audit of our systems and IT processes.”
Detailed technical and strategic audit
ramsac took a thorough look at RCM’s whole IT infrastructure, as Managing Director Robert May commented, “As well as a detailed audit of the technical resources, we also made a full strategic audit that included extensive discussions with RCM’s Board of Directors to confirm the top-level aims of the organisation and also a survey with all members of staff to establish the pain-points and needs of everyone working with the systems on a day to day basis. Correlating all this feedback we produced a roadmap that detailed the most cost-effective ways of achieving the best IT solutions for the business.”
Having put its IT provision out to tender, the RCM chose ramsac as its outsourced IT support and management supplier based upon the depth and breadth of its audit and its personal approach to ascertaining the needs of key stakeholders, as Chris Truman added, “ramsac took the time to fully understand our organisation and the needs of staff and members, whilst being mindful of our capabilities to provide our IT resource. ramsac also challenged our previous expectation of IT and offered a proactive, rather than simply reactive approach, to making our technology investments work fully for us.”
IT director, network manager & Support provider
Having taken on the role of IT director, network manager and support provider, ramsac helped RCM to migrate its systems to a thin client model, with the majority of services being hosted on the organisation’s servers and accessed remotely, with full services being available to authorised users either via mobile devices or any Internet-connected computer. This has taken the burden off users from having to host a cornucopia of software on each access device and the associated costs and inconvenience of doing so. ramsac also implemented its PhoenixAssist IT disaster recovery programme, which gives RCM immediate access to a serviced office, dedicated file server, broadband Internet connection and telephone line should vital IT services be interrupted. ramsac continues to manage the network with regular proactive site visits, they monitor RCM’s IT systems around the clock, to anticipate any potential issues and offers immediate telephone support for its team, both on-premises and remotely for mobile device support.
Progressive IT support
The benefits of progressive IT support and management have been very clear, as Chris Truman continued, “We are funded by members, so budgets have to be carefully managed and everything we do needs to be accountable and offer excellent value for money. ramsac’s service has made a big difference to us and having telephone support that is available to all members of staff is a big step up for us in terms of problem solving and making the most of our IT. ramsac has also helped us to upgrade outdated technology and fully realise the opportunities available from flexible mobile working. The feedback we have had internally is very positive on the changes that ramsac has driven.”
