SOCITM (Society of Information Technology Management)
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Local government veteran joins Socitm/Protocol Policy Systems partnership

Russell Francis has joined the Socitm Advisory/Protocol Policy Systems (PPS) partnership as UK Sales Consultant. Russell is an experienced computer services and software solutions sales professional in the local government sector, with a track record of over 30 years of helping clients to successfully address their ICT and digital challenges. He is also a long-standing member of Socitm.

Russell is spearheading the launch of the PPS IT policy system to UK local government, where creating a secure electronic environment is essential and compliance with national and international standards is mandatory. 

Having started his career in the 70s for a large IBM computer service bureau in Croydon, Russell became Local Government Product Manager in 1983 for an SME that developed software for the London Borough of Waltham Forest. In 1990, as Managing Director of Saffron, he oversaw software sales to 50 local authority housing departments, including 11 of the 32 London boroughs, resulting in significant financial growth for the business and the creation of 70 additional jobs. In 2000 that company was ultimately sold to Comino PLC (now part of Civica) where Russell assisted with the amalgamation of product and services and took responsibility at operational board level for managed service operations until leaving Comino in 2003. After taking a break overseas in 2005 to set up a yacht brokerage, Russell returned to the UK in July 2010 to take up the role of Head of Strategic Partnerships with Capita Software Services. 

For the three years prior to taking up his new role at PPS, Russell used his long term experience in the public sector to assist smaller software businesses in the open source world, helping them get to grips with Agile methodologies and Software as a Service (SaaS) delivery: the most recent example being the ‘Love Clean Streets’ and ‘Love Housing’ mobile application development projects initiated by Lewisham Council.

The IT Policy System developed by PPS has been used extensively in local/central government and commercial sectors in Australia and New Zealand. For the last seven years it has provided measurable cost savings to organisations needing to develop and deploy IT policies. The company has recently released a UK version of the software providing a comprehensive set of IT policies that are cross referenced to standards including ISO27002, PCI-DSS, PSN and SOX. Delivered via intranet, the system can be tailored and branded for each organisation. Delivery is being implemented in partnership with Socitm Advisory, who will work with local authority clients to ‘workshop’ their policy requirements. 

Russell is passionate about working with local government and is excited about this new venture, which combines Socitm’s reach and insight with Protocol Policy Systems’ successful technology.

For further information please contact: russell.francis@socitm.net

 

Channel website: https://www.socitm.net/

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