Building on the digital momentum to transform public services

Alec Harley, Scotland Portfolio Director at Leidos, discusses how the public sector must build on the transformation fast-tracked by the Coronavirus pandemic to drive public service improvement, creating world-leading services fit for future generations.

I had the privilege of sitting on the judging panel of this year’s Scottish Public Service Awards and was struck by how, in a year like no other, our public servants stepped up to continue providing services throughout the pandemic.

Many organisations showed remarkable agility in quickly adapting how they work and how they interact with the public. For example, the Registers of Scotland, who were shortlisted for the Digital Public Service Award, successfully launched five new online services in just four months, protecting people’s house moves, the property market and the wider Scottish economy. This represented one of the most significant changes in the land register process for several decades and puts the organisation in a strong position for further digital transformation.

Many other organisations similarly moved their services online, delivering online platforms in just weeks or months that may otherwise have taken years to design and deliver. The necessity to continue to deliver vital services showed just what is achievable.

The pandemic has taught us that people and organisations are more adaptable than we have given them credit for in the past and for the most part, there is now a visible appetite for transformation. Never again will Scotland have this opportunity to create such fundamental improvements to its public services and society as a whole.

My hope is that this will be a positive outcome from the pandemic. That we will build on the momentum of digital transformation to reinvent our public services, making them more personal, accessible, efficient and accountable.

For this to happen the government must put digital inclusion at the top of its priorities. Leidos worked in collaboration with ScotlandIS and other technology businesses on the Connecting Scotland programme at the start of the pandemic, helping thousands of the most vulnerable in society get online to access vital services and stay connected to friends and family.  As we face further weeks or even months of lockdown, we must continue to prioritise digital equality, providing devices and developing digital skills while ensuring connectivity to all parts of Scotland.

A recent report commissioned by the Scottish Government into the country’s financial recovery from Coronavirus pointed out the need for greater investment and prioritisation of our digital infrastructure. It claimed we are lagging behind the rest of the UK in terms of landing cables, internet routes and data centre capacity. This needs to be addressed and quickly to support innovation in public service delivery, with services designed around people not process.

Scotland also needs to adapt a more data-driven approach to public services, harnessing the wealth of data we have from both government and public sources to ensure we tailor public services to the current and future needs of society.

The importance of creating a rich data environment, supporting informed decision and policy making has been highlighted by the pandemic where the government has put data at the heart of every announcement. Transparency over the data allows all stakeholders to understand how very difficult decisions such as lockdowns and school closures are being arrived at. Demonstrating the reasons for these decisions means people are far more likely to support and adhere to the restrictions they are being asked to follow.

Currently, public sector data sources are fragmented which is very frustrating for people who are consistently being asked for their details by different departments and bodies, not to mention inefficient for the departments themselves. Ultimately, we want to get to a position where we have a National Data Platform, supported by a secure, reliable and scalable infrastructure, which will make us a fully integrated, connected nation.

The public sector is in a strong position to build on the digital momentum created by Coronavirus to drive improvements and efficiencies in public services.

If 2020 showed us the art of the possible, let’s hope that 2021 inspires us to go further, making genuine improvements to society for generations to come.