Working collaboratively to deliver sustainable and scalable digital transformation is achievable - but only with a user centred and skill focused approach.
These insights are drawn from our recent webinar with Euan Slack, Programme Director Central Digital Platform (CDP) at the Cabinet Office; Richard Baines, Deputy Director for Digital Delivery at DEFRA, and Fiona McAdoo, Transformation Director at Oracle. The conversation was chaired by David Wilde, General Manager - Government, at Government Transformation Magazine.
New research suggests that the greatest barriers to government digital transformation are a lack of internal skills, legacy integration and outdated procurement methods. This conversation focuses on collaboratively scaling digital transformation with a clear direction as a driving force.
Scaling digital transformation across government
For Slack, scaling digital transformation across government departments is less about the technology itself given the strong position of SaaS platforms and more about having a strong understanding of user base and building up skills. As Slack says "if you buy big, you need to make sure that your organisation is ready to deliver big."
McAdoo echoes this sentiment, the key is for the people within the organisation to understand "where are we unique?" and therefore where buying might be useful, but also where a different approach might be more effective. For her "user design and organisation design" understanding are at the heart of successful, directed transformation.
Baines returns to Slack's point about the importance of considering user needs as a driver for government officials, particularly when working across multi-skilled, hybrid teams. By focusing on wider goals the whole team can come together and solve challenges in varied ways.
Deploying SaaS to remove friction and improve integration
Baines highlights that legacy systems present a challenge across government, making interoperability a priority. Solving these integration challenges can lead to "tremendous agility." The CDP is a prime example, for Slack, where £300 billion of procurement is centralised and standardised, demonstrating the value of developing responsive data infrastructure.
For McAdoo, the key is recognise that there are already "all sorts of point solutions that exist within departments within organisations, that are serving quite specific needs" and acknowledge that rather than totally redesigning it is best to determine how they can integrate with one another.
To work effectively with commercial partners, McAdoo underscores the design focus she talked about earlier, having a clear direction leads to future-proof and scalable transformation. Baines agrees with this sentiment, foregrounding the value of "clear policy intent" as a guide when deploying technology and collecting rich data.
Letting engineers lead helps create the most innovative solutions, according to Baines, but others on the team are paramount for contextualising the "broader landscape." Slack agrres that this kind of "cross-functional collaboration" is vital.
Cross-agency collaboration
For Slack, the key to effective collaboration is the shared goal of designing digital solutions which are resilient to future transformation. Given the current pace of technological change it is important to be "agile" and responsive, hence why the CDP has integrated LLMs into its function to maximise efficiency.
McAdoo draws attention to the benefits of SaaS to support "delivery at pace and scale" with built in standardisation which conforms to government agenda, dismantling silos. She adds that "bolt on" services have limited use - focusing on AI as a case study - and circles back to the importance of asking what purpose digital services are needed for.
Ensuring security is maintained when adopting new services is critical for Baines, who highlights the ethical work of Tim Howard, a DEFRA colleague. Howard's recent blog considers the people and processes at the heart of digital systems and how to adopt best practices when harnessing new technologies.
Slack suggests the key to the build or buy dilemma is to be flexible and not "tie ourselves down." Having "balance and freedom" allows the right system to be used in the right context, whilst keeping standardisation and interoperability in mind.
One way this can be achieved is through rich APIs, according to McAdoo, which build deeper connections between interfaces. She further emphasises collaboration in these discussions, its all about "supporting each other" to think about the impact of potential changes.
Adopt, not adapt
As the conversation draws to a close, Baines cautions against getting locked into any approach in terms of engineering outlook or having a vendor-based approach. The key instead, is to keep a few, discrete principles in mind which drive software design. Slack highlights the value of rich API for making informed build or buy decisions. Having a wealth of product data "de-risks" adoption.
McAdoo rounds of the discussion by re-emphasising that the driving force behind adoption should be "the thinking and the change and the challenge work" in understanding what users need and what principles should underpin transformation in that context.
Overall, the three agreed on the importance of working collaboratively to adopt scalable, integrated systems requires reflection and direction.