With a tailored integration into the shared municipal framework, KOMBIT, and a continued focus on integration with future public systems such as Nemlogin-3 and the new MitID, launching in 2021, ID Connect emerged as the strongest and most advantageous choice.

Market Research

In East Funen, Lars Bruun Jelle, the IT Manager in Middelfart Municipality, was already researching the Identity Management solutions market when he came across ID Connect.

The market is vast and overwhelming, with many international providers, so we were keen to find a solution that suited Danish conditions. ID Connect’s solution provided precisely that, and it was highly agile, which allowed us to see that we could save many consultant hours. In general, the economics were both favorable and predictable, explained Lars Bruun Jelle.

A Good Match

In Middelfart, the crucial point was ID Connect’s approach to Identity Management, which is to provide insights into the organization’s data quality and then utilize that knowledge for access control and security.

Achieving a high level of data quality by starting with the concept that an employee is essentially ‘born’ into our payroll system and then assigned access and rights afterward just makes sense in our organization, said Lars Bruun Jelle.

Approved Business Case

Up to the present day, Middelfart Municipality had been using a manual solution for users, access, and security. The decision to choose a new solution had to be made within the ‘business’ in Middelfart Municipality, where Identity Management could be a complex topic to address.

We needed to demonstrate the value of ID Connect’s solution, and fortunately, we had a compelling case. Previously, the task required 1-2 full-time employees within the organization, and when I compared this resource consumption with the risk of human errors, it was easy to get a business case approved by the finance committee and the municipal director, explained Lars Bruun Jelle.

Lars Bruun Jelle stressed that one of the most critical arguments was that it wasn’t just a ‘nice-to-have’ solution.

It’s simply a requirement that we have solutions that ensure we comply with all GDPR regulations related to personal data. We have been working with GDPR for many years, so our organization and our work are well-documented in all processes and details, but the manual processes should naturally be handled.

Simultaneously, it was crucial that the new solution could support their journey towards the upcoming Nemlogin-3 and the NCIS approval, which the municipality will be audited on in the future.

That’s Why We Chose ID Connect

To achieve professional control over who has access to which systems and information. Being able to generate audit and GDPR reports for their ongoing documentation with a simple press of a button is a significant advantage, said Lars Bruun Jelle.

However, the IT manager in Middelfart was initially somewhat skeptical about one aspect:

My skepticism was about it being a SaaS and cloud solution. In the past, this has resulted in negative experiences with long response times, instability, and cumbersome processes for minor system changes. Still, I must admit that this is by no means the case with ID Connect’s solution, said Lars Bruun Jelle.

A Smooth Process and Implementation in Four Weeks

Middelfart’s IT manager is highly satisfied with the cooperation with ID Connect.

It was great that we could start with a POC agreement. That way, we got our hands into the system and tested real data in our environment, and the process has been streamlined. From the moment we signed the POC agreement until we completed testing and went live, only four weeks had passed.

During this period, their resource consumption ranged from half a day to a full day each week. Everything was accomplished through Teams meetings without a single visit from external consultants. I would call that impressive, both for my own department and for ID Connect, said Lars Bruun Jelle.

An Important Lesson from the Experience

From the beginning, Middelfart Municipality was challenged by ID Connect to think differently.

It was crucial to understand and see the possibilities in new concepts like job function and job profile roles and incorporate them effectively into the initial phase. A proper start, combined with a long-term strategy on how to use them on both employees and organizational units, will have a significant impact on the extent and speed of automation in the municipality going forward, said Lars Bruun Jelle.

The Future in Middelfart

As the municipality adopts more systems, the organization will become more involved. The plan is to select system owners who can create roles and job profiles for specific systems or organizational units themselves. This will automate the allocation of the most basic rights, ensuring a faster and better user experience for the municipality’s new employees.

A derived effect will be reduced resource consumption on administration and the allocation of system access. Equally important, the municipality will gain a central and continuously updated overview of user rights and system access.

That way, they expect to be able to eliminate some of the tasks from the IT department. Once the foundation is in place, each employee should have the opportunity to request access themselves, with subsequent approval directly from their manager, explained Lars Bruun Jelle.

Download the Middelfart Municipality customer case (Danish).