Case Study

San Diego is well known for ocean views, palm trees and California sunshine. But the County of San

Diego reaches far beyond the city. At 4,200 square miles, the county is larger than Delaware and Rhode Island. The eastern part of the county is home to impressive mountains, deep valleys and desert. Agriculture flourishes in many areas within the county.

The diverse topography creates a challenge for the county’s mobile work-ers, who need strong connections back to the network in order to do their jobs. Hundreds of the county’s mobile workers file reports from the field using laptops and tablet PCs.

Until recently, the topography caused workers to lose their connec-tions. Their applications would crash, and they’d lose all the data they’d entered. It was a frustrating process

that mobile workers would endure sev-eral times each day.

“They would get disconnected fre-quently,” said Harold Tuck, CIO for the county. “They would have to attempt to log back in five or six times a day, which included going through our authentication and security. It would be 30-45 minutes per day, per user, of lost productivity.”

That was not acceptable to the county, which brought in a solution from AT&T — a mobility virtual private net-work (VPN). The mobility VPN provides a persistent network connection. Work-ers no longer lose their applications or data. They don’t have to log back in several times a day, and they don’t need to re-enter data that’s been lost. Now, workers are more productive, with greater job satisfaction, because they’re able to serve more citizens each day.

Commitment to ProductivityWith the new solution, if there’s ever a

disconnect, the tool saves the applica-tion and data — and automatically finds the best connection when available. Users simply keep working, and don’t lose any work or time. The experience is seamless.

The county’s Land Use and Environ-ment Group (LUEG) sends inspectors out to agricultural and other remote areas. It has about 100 users on the mobility VPN. LUEG participated in a 90-day pilot project involving about 30 users. Field workers were excited about the performance of the new tool from the outset. In the pilot, workers were 31 percent more productive, as they were able to do more inspections per day. With increased productiv-ity and less need for office space and landlines, LUEG realized $130,000 in cost savings.

The county’s Health and Human Ser-vices Agency (HHSA) was so impressed

Expanding MobilityThe County of San Diego improves its mobile work force with persistent connectivity.

with the pilot, that it too implemented the solution. Now the HHSA has about 500 child welfare workers and 100 public health nurses using AT&T mobility VPN. These field workers are experiencing the same positive results, and are no longer dealing with the frustration of disconnects. They have more time to spend with clients — and need to put less time into doing paperwork in the office.

In all, the county supports more than 1,000 workers on the mobility VPN, with many more planned for the future. Even employees who aren’t strictly field workers benefit from the new tool. LUEG alone has more than 50 facilities and the mobility VPN enables many types of workers to stay con-nected as they move between those various sites.

The county’s commitment to greater productivity for mobile workers is part of its Government Without Walls (GWOW) ini-tiative. The GWOW approach aims to increase productivity in order to serve the county’s 3 million residents more cost effectively. The mobility VPN has the potential to further reduce paperwork, serve more citizens where they live and work, and bring greater value to taxpayers and the County of San Diego.

“We have GWOW because we recognize that within these 4,200 square miles where we deliver services, we have employees all over the place,” said Tuck. “To do service deliv-ery the way we want and need to, we need to go where the people are.” GWOW strives to give mobile workers all the tools they need to work from anywhere.

Innovation CouncilAnother factor in the improvement of mobile technology is

the county’s Innovation Council, which is made up of govern-ment employees and private-sector tech companies. “With the Innovation Council, we ask ‘What innovation can we bring into the county, using technology, to solve a business prob-lem that will make our employees more effective at what they

do?’ The Innovation Council decided that one of our very first areas to focus on was work force effectiveness,” Tuck said.

Better mobility was a good fit for that. The Innovation Coun-cil set up a vendor day for mobile technology, and it was there that the county learned more about the mobility VPN.

The solution is based on a monthly, per-user fee, as part of AT&T’s contract with the county, so it’s an operational expense. AT&T also helped with long-term planning. “The infrastructure is being put in by AT&T to allow us to grow,” Tuck said. “So we do have the flexibility we need for the future.” The mobility VPN solution is enterprisewide, so all five of the county’s large business groups will be using it.

“We can go out and solve for a specific need — or we can solve for a specific enterprise, over time,” said Christopher Roy, vice president of Public Sector, Western Region for AT&T. “And that’s really where we focus for the County of San Diego. They had immediate needs for today that we were able to solve for. But we also put in a mechanism and a system that allows the county to solve for future issues as well.”

Roy believes other government agencies could learn from the county’s experience with the mobility VPN. “In the County of San Diego, you find a county that is not necessarily unique in its problems. But it is unique in the way it solves them,” said Roy. “They’re an early adopter in the technology world, and in solving their problems with technology. I think if you looked across the country, you’d find other counties and municipali-ties that have similar issues. And I think they’ll follow in the footsteps of the County of San Diego, and will solve their problems in a similar fashion.”

Tuck believes this is a good example of public and private sector working together for the common good. “It’s the will-ingness of the private sector to partner with the public sector to get the best benefit and the best value for the taxpayer dollars,” he said.

For more information, please visit www.att.com/stateandlocal.

Christopher RoyVP, Public Sector Western Region, AT&T

Presented by

Harold TuckCIO, County of San Diego

The county’s mountains and valleys are a big challenge for mobile connectivity.

This e.Republic custom publication is sponsored by AT&T. © 2011 e.Republic. All Rights Reserved. Printed in the U.S.A. AT&T and the AT&T logo are trademarks of AT&T Intellectual Property