“This will change everything” was quite a popular phrase at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. In the world of business this phrase was mostly connected with changes in terms of digital transformation. But digital transformation has been an ongoing trend for the last 15 years. So what’s the different in digital transformation in the post covid-19 era? The answer is simple: what’s different is the speed of adoption of digital infrastructures. The urgency for action is dictated by the uncertainty in the global situation.
The new world context is affecting the pace of cloud adoption in regulatory inspections as well. A field such as regulatory enforcement that’s focused at ensuring the safety of our communities is a serious matter and the urgency for digital acceleration is very sensible there. It means that decisions must be made on a faster pace to ensure the functioning of law enforcing government agencies in the new reality of mass lockdown with growing infection rates.
If we have to summarize the focus that government agencies must keep in the current COVID-19 recovery era, it will come down to:
- Government agency need to make faster decisions
- They should focus on automating inspections and leverage on AI in inspections
- They should focus on real-time risk assessment
- They should focus on driving agility in inspections
- They need to stick to cloud-first approach
And all of these must be done on a much faster pace than before the COVID-19 era. So let’s get to the biggest question in this article:
How does digital acceleration in inspection management looks like?
Like every big question, there are a lot of “depends” in the answer of this one. The digital acceleration in inspections depends mostly on the digital adoption strategy of the organisation. In the public sector this means that the CIO must speed up the decision making in the roadmap of the digital adoption strategy. If there’s no digital adoption strategy in motion, then now is the time to make on.
Related: All you need to know about making a cloud adoption strategy
What are the possible ways do accelerate digital transformation in inspections?
- Don’t transform outdated legacy systems, move to an entirely new cloud service designed for inspection management. This can be the faster and smarter approach for transforming inspections. But a careful research is needed.Read our guide: How to find inspection management software online?
- If on a central level the government has successful history of cloud implementation, then the good example must be followed. Following an already known path can accelerate digital transformation in inspection. For example if a social care institution has a successful history of implementing cloud based case management solution, then the smart move for this institution will be to follow the same path when implementing an inspection management software.
- Reorganize spend and move funds from less valuable initiatives to more urgent ones like cloud adoption.
Related: How to approach cost-efficient cloud adoption?
What to expect from accelerated digital transformation in regulatory inspections?
Doing something on a faster pace in the public sector is definitely not normal. But the new reality must be accepted. This means that there are certain red flags that must be kept in mind when we approach accelerated digital transformation in the public sector:
- A balance between efficiency and resilience must be kept.
- Inspectors, administrators and functional leaders must be equipped with the required skills.
- Configurability that can adequately answer the needs to different use segments in inspections (an inspection software must offer configurability for different type of inspections – food safety inspections, construction building inspections, social care facility inspections, playground inspections, etc.
Related: How governments should prepare for the post-pandemic scenarios?
This all is a part of the strategic planning. Strategic planning includes the conversation for the future and the priorities that must be followed if the most likely future scenario is changed (a thing that already happened on a massive scale with COVID-19). A change of the possible scenario such as the global pandemic might require from CIO’s to change the pacing of the digital adoption strategy for inspections. Disruption is not a bad thing if we are able to predict the outcomes.
Do you need help with the strategic planning for the digital transformation of inspections in your organisation?
