Digital disruption in public sector — four ways the leaders are responding

In response to digital disruption, the leading public sector organisations have elevated the importance of technology within their organisations and chosen to modernise their processes through its implementation. Unit4’s Head of Public Sector, Mark Gibbison, looks at four of the common strategic responses.

People expect a lot from their public sector, and organisations are constantly under pressure to improve, often with limited resources and decreasing budgets. However, smart organisations are focusing on getting their infrastructure right, so they can increase the range, quality and convenience of service delivery to citizens. Here are four strategic responses from the industry frontrunners.

1. Empowering employees

In a climate of continuous change, providing the best possible service means optimising peoples’ skills – and many organisational bodies are turning to enterprise resource planning (ERP) technology to empower valued staff.

Equipping colleagues with modern task management tools better utilises their time, automating many of the low-value, repetitive tasks that interfere with their overall productivity. Reducing the admin burden makes work more meaningful for employees, allowing them to spend more time on citizen-focused services, while giving team leaders greater autonomy to assign strategic activities.

New ERP platforms are also highly robust, and accessible in any location with an internet connection, meaning staff don’t waste time getting frustrated with unreliable systems.

2. Improving operational efficiency

The best public sector organisations have discovered that cloud-based software and agile business applications provide the opportunity to review and modernise organisational processes and structures for their digital transformation.

As a result, they can respond to disruption and policy changes, and minimise their impact. The digital solutions they adopt use enhanced data insights to inform decision-making, streamline admin processes and be more proactive in managing budgets and spending.

3. Delivering transparency and accountability

The frontrunners are using ERP to meet diverse reporting demands of regulatory agencies, constituents and the public.

These new systems help them comply with legislation and ensure robust data security while identifying, tracking and avoiding improper payments. Their belief in the value of data — and the right technology solution to help them govern it — delivers accountability and transparency across all departments, and for all stakeholders.

4. Improving services for citizens

These organisations are using technology to change the way they behave and operate, internally and externally. They are personalising services and building front-office interfaces which notify citizens, verify identities and collect payments.

Internally, they are streamlining information-sharing across the organisation and enabling cross-agency collaboration for better, more co-ordinated services delivery. The result is better services which make a difference where they’re needed most.

Embrace constant change

These institutions realise that ERP technology is an increasingly critical tool in the battle to increase the range, quality and convenience of service delivery to their community. Only through investing in the right platform will they be able to create the radical transformation needed to react to constant change, in a way that keeps citizens satisfied.

And the icing on the cake is that ERP software isn’t just making the public happy; it is positively impacting the experiences of public services employees as well.

To improve public sector with the right technology, download the industry brochure: A HISTORIC OPPORTUNITY FOR PUBLIC SERVICES — why the public services industry has a golden opportunity and how the leaders are taking advantage of it.