Four factors driving local government digital transformation

When looking to learn more about local government digital transformation, here are four factors to consider.

Digital transformation is a change in technology and processes to enhance the experience of those inside an organization and the people they interact with. According to Gartner, “80% of government organizations are still at the initial or developing digital maturity stages.”

Regardless of how your organization compares to those in the private sector, digital transformation has numerous advantages for local governments, such as giving employees the opportunity to work from home and increasing efficiency. With local governments being asked to do more with less, digital transformation is becoming more important.

Four benefits of digital transformation for local governments

1.    Ability to work from home

Due to the COVID-19 global pandemic, companies and organizations had to rapidly shift from in-person operations to working from home. Organizations that already started their digital transformation had the advantage of being able to make the switch more easily. Meanwhile, organizations that had not started their transformation journey struggled with the new regulations and demands brought upon them by the pandemic.

Modernizing an organization’s technology involves turning to cloud-based solutions. Since files are held in the cloud rather than on physical machines, technical difficulties such as being locked out of your computer, or dealing with a broken one, have faster resolutions. There’s no concern about losing files or drafts of work when you lose access to a device. Cloud technology enables working from home.

As we move forward, the capability of working from home allows local governments to be more flexible in the face of uncertainty. A global pandemic likely won’t be the only cause of disruption that local governments will face. Hurricanes, flooding, snowstorms and other natural weather events may hinder employees from making it to the office, leading local government organizations to pause operations. Embracing digital transformation enables data and processes to be digitized and unified, and therefore safely accessed by the appropriate party remotely, minimizing disruptions.

2.    Better data usage

Local government digital transformation changes the way data is collected, used and stored. Data can be used to inform decision-making since modernization helps with data accuracy and relevancy. When data becomes clearer, less complicated to understand and more accurate, it becomes more valuable. Local governments and organizations can use the information provided by data to become more productive.

Data becomes more readily available for employees to look at; however, it still complies with data privacy requirements. A typical advantage of digital transformation is quick data retrieval; rather than searching through physical files, you can digitally search for and discover information.

3.    Smarter technology

Examples of new technology used with digital transformation include AI and machine learning. These technologies can be used to model and process data. Workday Adaptive Planning provides tools that allow you to easily go through the modeling process and quickly run models. Adaptive Planning also helps with creating reports and dashboards to visualize analytics.

Citizens seeking information or help from local government often visit these sites on their smartphones. A website that is mobile-friendly better serves its community than one that excludes mobile users.

4.    Increased efficiency

One way to improve efficiency with digital transformation is to use intelligent automation. Intelligent automation frees up employees to focus on more value-added work rather than continually working on repetitive tasks. With intelligent automation, a digital workforce pitches in and helps turn manual processes into automatic ones. An example is data entry: When someone, either within the government or outside of it, fills out a form, the data can be automatically uploaded rather than being manually entered.

The standardization of processes is one of the most important aspects of digital transformation. It ensures everyone working for the organization has the same experiences, and employees can save time and become more efficient with readily available data stored on the cloud instead of in physical files.