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Phil Moss, Chief Technology Officer, takes us through a typical day at Procurement for Housing. I’m more of an early morning person, so my day starts around 6am when I make a quick coffee and leave my home in Lancashire. Depending on my schedule, I’ll either turn left and drive to our office in Manchester where our software development team is based – they are the ‘techies’ working on the software behind our procurement frameworks. But if I’m meeting the people who use our technology – PfH’s sales team and account managers – then I turn right and head to our main office in Warrington. Where ever I am, everything stops at 10.30am. The technology team (that’s six of us) takes part in a daily ‘scrum’ call where everyone across all of our sites answers three questions: we want to know what they did yesterday; what their plans are for today; and what blockers they’re facing. Today’s scrum focused on automating categorisation and how we can ensure that lowest-level transactional data is routinely classified to detect if a member is spending too much on a certain product. As the largest spend aggregator in the UK social housing sector, PfH collects a lot of this transactional data. We manage over a million invoices a year – that’s £250 million of spending. Our aim is to use this unique position to provide housing-specific insights to landlords. Technology, in particular machine learning, is a key part of achieving this. Machine learning is a type of artificial intelligence. AI uses computer programmes to think and learn like humans and machine learning is one of those programmes. It’s all about identifying patterns in historical data – algorithms learn those patterns and then forecast future trends. Historically, the housing sector hasn’t been great at managing data or categorising products – and this has led to a delay in the adoption of AI and smart analytics. There is very little granular detail in the sector, so it’s been hard to introduce machine learning for predictive analysis, or to compare spending data with public data sets to see if a housing provider is paying too much for, for example, kitchen refurbishments. The scrum meeting today focused on tackling this problem. Since I began at PfH around a year ago, I’ve used technology to put data at the heart of everything we do. Every single line of pricing, transactional and CRM information goes into our data warehouse where it is used for analysis and reporting. On a monthly basis, this data warehouse examines 300,000 lines of spending data from more than 900 housing providers. For the last six months, our team has been refining the quality of this data and developing technologies, bespoke to the social housing sector, which we can use to categorise information and provide members with intuition around their procurement spending. This data analysis was taken to a new level when PfH bought Valueworks. The system was specially designed for the social housing sector and it provides a collaborative, real-time view across all spending data so that housing providers can more effectively track prices, control costs and improve quality. The software enables us to group our members’ transactional data into specific programmes of work and then identify whether they are spending too much on certain products compared with their peers, whether they are purchasing several types of one product unnecessarily or whether there are better value alternatives available. After today’s scrum meeting, I meet with PfH’s six-strong account management team who liaise directly with our members on a day-to-day basis. One of the digital initiatives we’ve introduced recently is VFM reporting. This analytics service gives members insight into their spending over a particular period, highlighting saving opportunities. Reports are created using data dissected by our Microsoft PowerBI software and account managers present the reports to members. I’m meeting the team to take them through the latest capabilities of the system. Today, we talk about how the reports can tackle ‘product drift’, when an organisation spends less on the core products that PfH has negotiated reduced rates for, leading to larger bills. I also explained that VfM reports can pinpoint patterns such as a member that is spending more on a particular product compared with its expenditure last year. After lunch at my desk, I rush across the M62 to a meeting at Liverpool University’s School of Electrical Engineering, Electronics and Computer Science. PfH runs a knowledge transfer partnership (KTP) with the university to explore how machine learning can help housing providers’ procurement activities and I’m meeting our KTP associate, Dr David Hamilton. KTPs help businesses like PfH to innovate by linking them with research organisations like Liverpool University. They enable companies to bring in the latest skills (David has a PhD in distributed algorithms and machine learning is his specialist area) to deliver a specific, strategic innovation project. For us, that innovation project is showing housing providers the potential of their data and helping them to manage and use it in the right way. Our KTP is coming to an end and today I’m speaking to David about the next steps, particularly around using predictive analysis to learn from asset management invoice data and how we can link this data to price indices to show housing providers the best time to buy certain products. Back in Warrington, I meet Steve Malone, PfH’s managing director. We are discussing the latest smart procurement technologies to use with our members. Data from technologies such as IoT thermostats, window sensors or smart boiler parts is already recognising ‘failure in advance’ and this could help housing providers switch from reactive repairs to planned maintenance. Machine learning could be used to recommend comparison products, such as a boiler that is cheaper, has a longer warranty and a smaller carbon footprint. Housing providers could also use ‘emotional AI’ to analyse social media mentions about suppliers and combine this with data on contract performance, legal disputes or redundancies to build risk profiles. My day finishes around 5.30pm when I head home. If there is enough daylight remaining, I might jump on the bike and enjoy the Lancashire countryside before an early night. In reality, I probably spend much of the evening negotiating with my two children to convince them it’s bedtime! Phil Moss is the chief technology officer for Procurement for Housing. http://procurementforhousing.co.uk/ If you'd like to share your housing sector experience, all you need to do is get in touch at news@housing-technology.com.

George Schaar, Head of Research & Development at Stratis Security, talks to us about his 20 year career in security. I’ve worked in security for more than 20 years, protecting the homes of celebrities and the rich as well as developing technology to secure homes and housing estates from Ipswich to Ireland. For the past three years, I’ve been working with our specialist team from our technology innovation base in Suffolk. There really is a melting pot of the latest smart homes and internet of things solutions here, with other companies such as Facebook, Cisco and Nokia also on the same site. My current focus is progressing the development of a secure app which allows clients to monitor camera surveillance in their properties remotely. Clients can also get alarms alerting them on their phones if windows or doors have been broken or tampered with. Fingerprint and facial recognition Our solutions include fingerprint identification technology, which is nonintrusive, fast and efficient and can secure large areas over many levels. For example, entrances and exit points to lifts and stairwells, through to individual rooms, cupboards and flats. Stratis has also developed facial recognition for entry systems, with our cameras scanning the iris and matching faces from a prestored database of images. Used in conjunction with video surveillance, we have significantly tightened security and improved accountability at a major residential block in Ipswich, where residents now show their faces at the front entrance to gain entry. I never thought I’d be implementing technology that first inspired me from Blade Runner in the early 80s!   We have also helped combat a range of issues at two blocks of flats in Ipswich, including rats in ground floor bin-stores as a result of fly-tipping, as well as graffiti and non-residents, who would gather outside and in reception areas, gaining access to the blocks and moving freely around the building. In one of the blocks, we installed facial recognition cameras and key fobs, with card access to lifts and stairwells, making it possible to prohibit access as well as track individuals and only allow access to designated areas.   Social housing applications For social housing providers, our technologies have many applications, such as if a tenant has lost or forgotten their key, or for vulnerable residents in extra-care schemes or sheltered accommodation, allowing their relatives, friends or carers to gain access. We were at the CIH conference in Manchester earlier this year and are now talking with a range of housing providers about how to deploy our solutions as part of their business transformation programmes and their wider smart home and internet of things strategies.   Lasers No longer being the exclusive province of science fiction, long-range lasers are an effective and flexible way to monitor and protect your property. Lasers can be set up as an invisible fence around an office, for example, or in areas that are targeted for high-value materials, such as a church roof or to protect copper piping. Any tampering to the laser triggers an alert, which is sent back as a high-quality audio file that can be monitored remotely.   Destruction day My team and I are currently working towards ISO accreditations. With the impact of the Grenfell tragedy, we have also developed fire safety and reinforced doors. At the time of writing, we are arranging a ‘destruction day’ on September 26 at our base in Martlesham Heath in Suffolk where we have challenged the 4,000 staff at Adastral Park (home also of BT’s innovation centre) and invited them to break through our reinforced doors with sledge hammers, angle grinders and cordless drills. So confident are we of the resilience of our reinforced doors, we have also invited Britain’s strongest man, Eddie Hall, along to pit his strength against our doors. George Schaar is the head of research and development at Stratis Security http://www.stratissecure.com/  

Work is certainly varied for Jenny Shorter, a senior consultant at IT services firm Sovereign Business Integration Group, who revisits a typical week at work. I’ve seen a great deal of change in the housing sector. Mostly, it now requires a far more commercially-minded approach than it did when I first joined the sector in the 1990s. I know that I have to be far more timely in my pitches to clients and in responding to their requests for support and always mindful of the return to be gained and how quickly this will be realised. Overseeing two main housing client accounts as well as a range of other business-critical implementations means that much of my time is spent client-side or working with suppliers on the client’s behalf, and while mobile working can mean being on the go a lot of the time, I really like the opportunity to be hands-on. Tower Hamlets Community Housing and East End Homes, two of my on-going client accounts, are both well-established London-based housing providers that have longstanding relationships with Sovereign, where we manage their IT provision including support for their housing management systems. I recently visited Orchard’s offices in Newcastle, immersing myself in their products and meeting new and existing contacts to deepen my understanding of their products and who to go to in order to troubleshoot or fact-find for my clients. Managing suppliers for housing clients It makes sense to have a close relationship with the suppliers to our market in order to broaden my understanding of their vision, product pipeline and so on; it’s a great way for us to help our clients to get the very most out of the relationship with the supplier as well as benchmark their products against the competition. It can also help with any troubleshooting issues, playing the role of the ‘honest broker’ to help to move things along and keep lines of communication open on both sides. My job is to step in with technology suppliers wherever I’m needed, either on behalf of our client or the Sovereign implementation team (some of whom are wholly client-side), either negotiating the sale, arranging product demonstrations or project managing the implementation itself (for example, just last week I was working on a new Promaster asset management software implementation for a client). The project management role is full on and typically involves setting up meetings to agree the way forward or fine-tune the client roadmap, procuring the product, booking implementation resources, training staff who will use the product, and then chasing any issues that need to be escalated. I’ve just finished a four-hour session with Golding Homes after running a requirements gathering exercise with the customer services team there. The switch from an inner London housing provider to a Kent-based one resulted in very different requirements, no doubt due to the different demographic groups each serves, but they each had interesting suggestions about things that they currently do manually that could be automated. It’s great to work with an organisation that recognises that there is work to do with the culture within the organisation as part of a digital transformation project. Any organisation can buy new software and implement it, but if your people don’t have the right mindset or aren’t supported to have the right mindset, the service won’t improve and no return on investment will be achieved. Consultant with a housing background Working with housing providers, in common with any other industry, it’s a great help to have directly relevant industry experience. Some people will embrace change, while for others, there’s a vested interest in being wary. I’m not a standard IT consultant but instead someone who has worked in the housing sector for more than 14 years. It puts me in a strong position because clients are assured that I know their world, their challenges and speak their language. It can really help to get over some of the hurdles that are often faced when implementing change. As well as keeping an eye on our clients’ progress, I am also keen to ensure that Sovereign is hitting the mark. I’ve been working on a project recently that involves reviewing a client’s IT lifecycle. It has provided me with enormous insight into our processes and procedures and how we can continue to improve these. Working in the housing sector As I look back over 20 years of working in the housing sector, there are two key ‘takeaways’ for me: Firstly, the social housing sector is so much more budget-driven than it ever was, but I always make sure my clients are aware that cheap can be more expensive in the long run. It’s great that we’ve moved away from a ‘cost-focused’ decision model, but I always like to make sure my clients make the right decision considering the whole of their organisational needs and plan for future investment. What you think looks good on paper today could turn out to be more expensive to implement in the long run. If for some reason, it doesn’t go according to plan, you are likely to spend a great deal more putting it right. Secondly, the upside is that customers are really driving the impetus for so much change in the housing sector, especially when it comes to technology. If you can’t communicate with your customers effectively, or be responsive when they need repairs, maintenance and so on, this just costs the organisation, in the long run. Housing providers have woken up to the fact that there is more choice for tenants and so, if there’s a better service to be had, some tenants could potentially go elsewhere. They don’t always have to take what’s on their doorstep. Jenny Shorter is a senior consultant for housing IT services at Sovereign Business Integration Group. http://www.sovereign-plc.co.uk/