Governments around the world have been embarking on the digital transformation of their services, both internally and with the forward-facing services offered to their citizens. A new report selects three success factors for these projects.
In most countries, digital technologies are having a major impact on government and are disrupting public services. The drivers for digital transformation vary, from lowering costs to better co-ordination of services. At the forefront is often, and arguably should be, the improvement of services offered to citizens.
Progress around the world is uneven and some countries are more successful than others at different stages of the digital transformation journey. A review by Enterprise Insights places Denmark at the top of the leader-board for the most effective digitization of government services. Denmark is followed by Australia, South Korea, the U.K. and Sweden. Notably the U.S. and Canada do not feature in the top ten.
General requirements for driving digital transformation success include adopting a clear strategy aimed at fundamental transformation; having strong leadership, who understand the technology and its cultural impact; and ensuring that the workforce has the necessary skills and are on-board with the projects.
A new report from Government Technology Leaders has assessed three factors for public sector digital transformation success. These are: understanding the impact of licensing; adopt more cloud; and putting innovation first.
Licensing
While software licensing may not jump out as an immediate digital transformation success factor, the report notes how moving to the cloud (necessary for almost all digital transformation projects) “has a significant impact on licensing as it isn’t simply a case of lift and shift.” Getting licensing wrong can mean services are not accessible across all platforms, especially mobile devices where there may be restrictions in place within certain geographical areas.
Cloud services
Many government services have been slow to adopt the cloud, despite the significant advantages as a fundamental building block of digital transformation. Reasons for this include concerns over application migration, security issues and compliance. Cloud services offer almost unlimited and dynamic IT resources and they can facilitate rapid business change.
Innovation needs to come first
Digital transformation projects in the public sector take place under extremely tight budgetary constraints, and they need to to be well-thought out. It is important to focus on the fact that technology is a means to accomplish business goals, not an end in itself. This means that the process and the service expectation need to be designed, developed and well-thought out in advance and then the appropriate technology selected. Simply selecting a technology and expecting it to deliver is a recipe for disaster.
