Government In The Cloud: Myths That CIOs Must Be Aware Of

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Government CIOs have a lot on their hands. Busting myths about cloud adoption is one of them for better or worse. Debunking myths requires their understanding. Even though it sounds like a minor thing to fix, there are myths that can slow down governments and enterprises on their road to digital transformation.

1. “Saving money is the only cloud adoption motive”

Cost-efficiency is important and cloud adoption is the best long-term direction to achieve it. However this is not the solely reasons that enterprises and government are turning to cloud. For decades there’s been stereotypes about the government that everything that happens there is slow and outdated. Cloud adoption is a key not only to cost-efficiency, but also to agility.

Government CIOs must look not only at financial cost-optimisation sheets, they must be looking beyond that. For this they need to analyse different use cases of cloud. In order for cost goals to be achieved, the usability of the cloud solution must be explored.

Related: How to approach cost-efficient cloud adoption

How to ensure that the cost optimisation goals will be achievable?

CIOs and digital transformation leaders must be aware of the importance of proof-of-concepts (PoC). This is a demo software that covers predefined use cases.

Example:
If you’re a CIO that is exploring opportunities for cloud adoption in government agency for food safety, you don’t just buy a software through online checkout. You run some meetings with the supplier of the cloud service and then you ask for PoC that can recreate a specific experience. This experience might be running an inspection management process with the supplier’s cloud software. This is one of the best ways to ensure that the cloud solution can actually deliver the cost-optimisation that is promised.

Related: The Importance of testing inspection software with PoC

Contact Canalix now if you’re looking for inspection software demo that can deliver specific use case.

2. “Cloud is the end goal”

Formulating a cloud strategy is important. Governments and enterprise that haven’t adopted cloud yet, must look at their strategy first. However, when the stage of implementing the cloud comes, the functional leaders must be aware of the end goal. And they must be educated that the cloud is just a means to achieving the goal. The goals may be agility, cost savings, resource utilization, improving the user experience for citizens, public servants, inspectors, etc.

Related: Understanding cloud strategy in governments

Implementing cloud solutions in governments is not a single warrior effort. It’s a group effort. That’s why CIOs must invest some time in making everyone involved in the implementation phase to understand the benefits that cloud will bring to the organization’s processes.

3. “Migrating to cloud is one-time effort”

Let’s say that a local government adopts cloud by using case management software. This is one path to cloud. But there are also many other different paths. If the local government has a successful use of the cloud case management software, it means that they should adapt cloud for other processes as well. This is the moment where CIOs must prepare the organizations to go along a new cloud transformation road.

Example:

Once the operation process of case worker is optimized via cloud solution, then it’s natural for the organization to optimize the rest of the processes. As a next step in this example it would be strategically smart to transform the work of inspectors by adopting inspection management software to fully leverage the cloud principle. This is a good example for long term digital transformation planning, that is designed to bring gradual improvements.

Related: How investing in cloud create saving for governments and enterprises

It other words it means that once a government successfully moves a process in the cloud, doesn’t mean that the work is finished. It means that work begins. This is a complex process. It means that the CIOs must be careful when choosing cloud supplier, because the supplier must be not only a service delivery entity, but also a great consultant and partner.

Get in touch with Canalix if you need to book a consultation for adopting cloud in the inspection management.

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4. “Cloud is overrated, companies are moving away from cloud”

Companies are not moving away from cloud. On the contrary. Today the migration to cloud is safer than ever. This can be confirmed by data from a single google search. Actually we’ve written a dedicated blog post about the cloud adoption being a key player in the post-pandemic new normal.

Read it here: Cloud – the new normal of regulatory compliance (with insights from IT decision makers for cloud adoption)

5. “Our cloud strategy is to move one of our processes on the cloud”

Strategy is a big thing. It should set a long-term direction with end goals. CIOs in governments and enterprises are responsible for formulating the cloud adoption strategy. Along the way for achieving these goals, there must be strategic plans. These plans have the objective to set the right priority for cloud migration and to form a cloud implementation plan. They must not be mistaken for cloud strategy.

Related: Everything you need to know about cloud adoption

Summary

Setting apart myths from facts is a key step for ensuring that everyone understands the benefits of cloud. It all starts from the IT leaders in governments and enterprises, they formulate the strategy, they debunk the myths. The second figure next to them are the functional leaders of the different departments – inspectorates, financial departments, human resources, etc. Together with the IT leaders they must share a common understanding of the benefits of cloud. Ensuring that all levels of the organization – whether it’s public or private organization – understand the reality behind myths will enable organizations to fully leverage on the benefits of the cloud.

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Digital transformation across all government services – how to achieve this?

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Comparing governments with businesses has always helped individuals to understand the concept of government better. It’s the same when it comes to comparing digital transformation in enterprises with eGovernment transformation. In both cases we have a big structure that is divided on different department levels – finances, social care, justice, food safety, road safety, etc. However, in terms of complexity there will always be one winner – and it’s the government.

How complexity differs in businesses and governments?

Businesses are serving the market and make their decisions with the goal of extracting a benefit from the market. Governments are beyond that – they serve both the public and the business and have a regulatory function to make decisions based on information that is gathered with paperwork or e-government services. That’s why we talk about whole other level of complexity.

If we take a close look at different levels within a government we will be able to gain a clear picture on the complexity we’re talking about. Let’s take for an example the structure of the government financial management. If a business doesn’t plan budgets wisely and doesn’t take financial decisions based on objectives like cost-efficiency, then the business will collapse. It’s the same with the public sector. That’s why financial systems have streamlined processes and principles that ensure the financial vitality of an organization.

Related: How to approach cost-efficient cloud adoption in governments?

If a closed eco-system like a small or medium business starts automating their financial management process by process, then we will have a classic digital transformation plan in action. Things in governments are a little bit more complicated. It’s simply so because the complexity of governments requires from the IT decision makers, CIOs and functional leaders the look further in the picture.

Why government CIOs need to look further in the digital transformation picture?

Let’s take for an example a social care regulator. Digital transformation in such structure will start by transforming the internal processes: first automating case management operations, then the inspection management processes, etc. The next stage of transformation will capture the processes with external agents by building up self-service portals. The self-service portals might serve the needs of the Ministry of social care at first and then expand to serving citizens. At certain point the social care bodies will have too much portals to work with. This is the moment when the CIO must come with a solution to integrate the automated processes and move every service under the same roof. This is what we call a fully functional eGovernment platform. To realise the full potential of this concept, CIOs must be able to look far in the digital transformation picture.

Transforming one process may catalyse big transformation across the economy

In times where changes happen fast, public finances are concerned with issues such as cost optimisation and efficient allocation of public money. E-government solutions are common means to achieve this. However, the transformation can’t encompass all government areas at once. It always starts with a single process and ends up transforming the whole ecosystem. In terms of where transformation in the public sector starts from, it always starts with the biggest areas of expenditures. These might be: social care and health, food safety, construction, financial regulations, etc.

Read more: How to set an eGovernment strategy?

So if we look for an answer to the big question how to drive digital transformation across all government services, we must stick to the old rule: start with a strategy. Then do things process by process. Make a long-term plan and create a team that will help you achieve this.

Are you looking for an eGovernment platform that will allow you to integrate automated services like case management and inspection management? Contact us.

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How investing in cloud services creates savings for government agencies?

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Everyone have heard government leaders talking about cutting costs. This is a budgetary policy that is happening in every EU country. Now in times of global health, social and economic crisis, these conversations are taking place more often than ever. Making cuts in the budgets seems like a shortcut to getting numbers in order. But shortcuts are not everything. A long-term cost optimisation policy is the smarter way to go for a variety of reasons.

Related: How digital safety inspection program can reduce the cost of inspections?

Shortcut plan vs long-term strategy?

The use of outdated systems in the public sector has led to reduction of the work load and challenged the efficiency of areas like regulatory enforcement in the peak of the covid-19 in Europe. More specifically the inspection management part of the regulatory agencies was challenged when strict social distance measures applied. This affected the citizens and the efficiency of the workforce, operating on the inspection management part.

Read now: A guide for finding the best inspection management software online

As a result there are a lot of conversation about cutting costs in government agencies now. However, optimizing costs is the direction for government agencies that are using outdated systems to run their processes.

“Government leaders often fall into “salami-slicing” budget cuts across the board. “Government leaders’ approach is to make incremental cuts to budgets areas across the board, rather than taking a more strategic cost optimization approach. These cuts can be particularly damaging to IT, derailing digital projects and ignoring the positive impact that budget spent on IT can have in reducing costs elsewhere in the organization.” says Cathleen E. Blanton, research vice president at Gartner.

Digital Transformation Drives Efficiency and Cost Optimisation

With the events that happened in 2020, government CIOs must evaluate whether the government agencies can deliver their services to the public with the current work model. After this assessment is made, the CIO must research alternative models of work. We’re living in the age of cloud technologies, so if we talk about transforming an overlooked field like inspection services, the cloud alternative must be on the top of the list.

Related: All you need to know about cloud adoption in government agencies

By researching cloud alternatives, CIOs must focus on the values of the cloud, but also to make sure that the new work models won’t be a challenge for the workforce. The values may vary. For example in the inspection management part the value may be about optimizing costs for travel of inspectors, in the case management part it may be about optimizing the processing time. The values vary at the different levels of government organizations. The good news is that with a good plan, CIOs may have an overview of the expected outcomes before buying a cloud software for inspections or for somethings else.

Related: Why is it a good idea to test a cloud software with PoC (proof of concept)?

Plan smart, implement cloud smarter

Adopting cloud for government agencies is not a simple task. It must be planned carefully and at different stages. If we look at the wholesome of processes behind regulatory enforcement, we will see room for different software solutions – inspection scheduling, inspection management, compliance management, case management, self-service portals and other e-government solutions. If the cloud implementation is planned to cover different solutions at different stage, then it will be one smart plan that will not only implement cloud, but will also do it in progressive way. It means that at every stage the workforce will be more mature to extract the values that are promised by the cloud.

Related: How route optimisation reduces costs in regulatory agencies?

The strategic approach of cost optimisation requires long term planning skills. This approach starts with formulating clear strategy and then implementing it.

Related: How to formulate cloud adoption strategy?

How to choose the right cloud service supplier?

There are hundreds of options on the SaaS market of cloud solutions for e-governments. However, when choosing a cloud service supplier, CIOs must look for something more than that. They need to identify a supplier, who is willing to be a partner and contribute to the planning of the most optimal cloud adoption plan.

Do you need help for cloud integration of inspection software and case management platforms for government agencies? Or you just want to start with gathering data via self-service portals and plan the further cloud adoption for other public services?

Contact us now.
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How Governments Should Prepare For The Post Pandemic Scenarios?

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Just as almost everywhere in the world, governments in EU are facing wave of strategic decisions designed to help government agencies to be prepared for new global outbreaks of covid-19. The functional leaders within government agencies and enterprises are engaged in planning activities that are supposed to fix the damages that the pandemic inflicted not only on the social and economic life, but also on the work process within their own functions. The good post pandemic plan start with looking at certain possible scenarios.

What do we mean by “possible scenario”?

Since the global pandemic is still not well known from the science, there are hundreds of possible outcomes for the next few months. When we describe those possible outcomes, then we have a possible scenario for the future. Describing a few different directions for the future is what would mean to have a possible scenario. As we already mentioned in our previous blog post, researches made among IT decision makers are already indicating that the changes induces by the pandemic are more likely to be permanent.

Related: Cloud inspection solutions – the new normal of regulatory compliance

The promise for permanency of the new normal is what drives the major wave of rethinking and reshaping strategy in enterprises and governments. The adoption of cloud technology is what seems to be one of the major directions to go with for government agencies. The government CIOs have the hard task of driving these conversations and preparing their organizations to respond in the most optimal way to these possible future scenarios.

Related: How to formulate the cloud adoption strategy for government agency?

What’s the plan for the government agencies?

Let’s check what data we have so far. There are possibilities of new waves of covid-19 infections, new lockdown and social measures to slow the spread of the pandemic. Researches are saying that the new work models are likely here to stay. Based on this data we can assume how the next months and years are going to look like.

However, having a possible scenario doesn’t mean that we can forecast the state of financial sheets. It only means that we can plan a transformation model that will:

1) Allow the workforce to operate remotely

For example:
In case of another regime of strict measures, the workforce must be able to work from home by using an electronic workspace. This is why it’s important for every government agency to have a well formulated cloud adoption strategy.

Related: Everything you need to know about cloud adoption in government.

2) Allow the organization to save costs in the long run

For example:
Cost-efficiency must be a priority when the organization transitions to cloud. The new solution must allow the company to cut costs. For example if we talk about digital transformation of regulatory agency, then the agency may have to change to using cloud inspection software. With the use of AI and data automation the software can optimize the allocation of resources and therefore cut on costs.

Related: How to approach cost efficient cloud adoption?

What makes a good strategic decision?

The bottom line is that when CIOs plan for the future, they must look at new directions and do it with the understanding that these directions are new realities. They must come up with strategy that will allow the organization to be fully functional for the times ahead. No matter what scenario rolls out, the CIOs decisions’ outcome must be sure win for the organization. That’s what makes the decision strategic. Do you want to know more about strategic decisions in the field of e-government solutions such as case management and inspection management?

Contact us now.

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Debunking 4 Myths About AI Technologies

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“The robots will replace humans and there will be no jobs for people”. In the distant past the unknown was a source for imagining evil powers that threaten everything that humans created. Today the new technologies serve as the new unknown and we create myths about them too. The myths have always been here to help us invent villains. But with more knowledge at our hands, we also got better at debunking them.

AI technologies are making its way in all levels of governments and enterprises today. That’s why it’s more and more important for CIOs to understand the value of AI without making wrong assumptions, based on myths. Are you ready to bust a few myths about AI with us?

Let’s start with myth #1:

AI can replace human thinking?

Artificial intelligence is called artificial for a reason. It can replace human intelligence up to a point. AI can learn how to execute tasks, but if the conditions of this task change, then AI will fail. To say that AI will replace human thinking sounds more like a Terminator movie plot and less like reality.

AI can learn things independently of human touch

AI technologies do not learn on their own. They need human control. The AI needs updates, constant integration of new knowledge, etc. That’s why when choosing an AI boosted software service, CIOs must pay close to attention to the technological state of the product they will use.

Related: Guide for finding the best inspection management software

AI makes decisions independently of humans

AI is data & rules-driven technology. Rules are defined by human experts. While the AI can independently solve simple tasks, based on pre-defined rules, sometimes there is complexity that is far beyond the capacity of AI. This is where human involvement is needed. We have a perfect example for the way AI can transfer the decision-making to a human party:

Let’s imagine that a citizen is filing an appeal for review to a government agency that is governing the field inspections. While the citizen files the data of his appeal on the front-end of the Agency’s website, on the back-end an AI is trying to categorise the complexity of the case based on the gathered data.

With a well defined set of rules, the AI would be able to set a relevant complexity score. If the case is too complex (above certain score) it will be send for review by human. If the case is simple enough for automatic processing through the AI, then it will be automatically allocated to an inspector and the inspection scheduling and execution will happen in the most optimal way.

Related: Learn more about inspection management and AI complexity score

We worked so far so good, so we don’t need AI

AI is not a magic that will instantly improve the business outcomes within an organization. Whether your company needs or does not need AI, it should be a decision based on data. In other worlds, every CIO must be able to answer why his organization does or does not need AI.

Having visibility on technologies and knowing how they can or can’t help on the strategy of the organization is important. The business needs are ever evolving and the decisions that are made today may not apply for tomorrow’s technological landscape. That’s why no matter where a government agency or an enterprise may stand in terms of adopting AI, they must have their research done.

Debunking myths is easy. Staying always alert to how technologies evolve is hard. Do you want to follow what’s new with AI and inspection software? Sign up for our newsletter.

Contact us now.
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