Digital Government Technology Platforms (DGTPs) – Designing, unifying and growing e-Government platforms

As governments shift towards digital administration and services, they have the potential to increase accessibility for citizens, save money in both the short and long term, as well as respond quickly to changing customer behavior due to digital. The move towards unifying digital platforms for governments presents a unique set of challenges and many opportunities that could be leveraged with best practices. I will give more insight into digital administration’s needs, challenges, and options and share best practices for launching e-Government platforms and scaling them successfully.

What are Digital government technology platforms (DGTPs)?

Unified Digital Government Technology Platforms (DGTPs) are interconnected software and technology solutions designed to streamline and automate various government processes. These so-called e-Government platforms aim to provide a seamless and efficient experience for citizens, businesses, and government employees by integrating multiple systems and services. 

A fully unified e-Government platform (DGTP) typically includes a range of different components, such as:

• E-Government portals: Providing online access to government services, such as tax filing, personal data management, licenses and permits, and even online voting.
• Digital identity management: Enabling citizens and businesses to prove their identity and access government services online.
• Online payment systems: Allowing citizens and businesses to pay for government services and fees online.
• Case management systems: Providing government employees with the tools to manage and track cases and requests.
• Data analytics and reporting: Enabling government agencies to collect, analyze, and report on data to improve decision-making and service delivery.

The ultimate goal of DGTPs is to create a more efficient, transparent, and citizen-centric government by leveraging technology and data. Integrating various systems and services allows DGTPs to reduce administrative burdens for citizens and businesses, improve service delivery, increase transparency and accountability, and reduce overall taxes and fees for public services.

However, implementing DGTPs can be complex and challenging, requiring significant technological investment, staff training, and change management. Despite this, many governments worldwide are investing in DGTPs to improve how they interact with citizens and businesses and deliver better public services.

Benefits of using digital platforms

Digital government technology platforms (DGTPs) benefit the Government and its citizens. By providing a unified platform for accessing information and services, governments can reduce costs associated with manual processes and eliminate duplication of effort, resulting in improved efficiency. Additionally, digital e-Government platforms can increase accessibility for citizens by allowing them to access government information and services anytime, anywhere, with an internet connection, and they don’t need to rely on opening hours or travel to distant administration buildings. Furthermore, digital platforms can improve the user experience for citizens by providing a more intuitive and convenient way of interacting with government information and services rather than confusing bureaucratic systems.

Here is a list of some of the most notable benefits: 

1. Reduced costs associated with manual processes
2. Elimination of duplication of effort
3. Increased efficiency of operations with fewer mistakes
4. Improved accessibility for citizens
5. Ability to access government information and services anytime, anywhere with an internet connection – 24/7 opening hours
6. A more intuitive and convenient way of interacting with government information and services
7. Greater transparency in the delivery of services and potentially also the costs
8. Easier integration between different departments within a government organization without paperwork
9. Provision of more tailored solutions to meet specific needs and offer personalized services
10. Increased security through the use of encryption technologies
11. Faster implementation for future services
12. Possibility to add new services for citizens
13. Providing an essential infrastructure for businesses and the economy
14. Improving the “Ease of doing business” by offering automatic or streamlined processes
15. Higher efficiency leading to potential tax cuts overall lower overhead

Challenges of creating and maintaining an e-Government platform

Despite all the excellent features and benefits, significant challenges also need to be overcome. Especially when creating a digital platform for government and government agencies, several key challenges must be considered:

• Cost: Developing and maintaining a digital platform can be costly. It requires significant upfront investments in technology, infrastructure, and personnel to ensure that the platform is reliable, secure, and user-friendly. This can be difficult for government agencies that have limited budgets and resources.
• Collaboration and Coordination: Developing a digital platform often requires cooperation and coordination among multiple government agencies and stakeholders. This can be challenging as different agencies may have other goals and priorities, and coordinating their efforts can take time and effort.
• Data Security and Privacy: Government digital platforms often handle sensitive personal and financial information, making data security and privacy a top priority. Ensuring the platform is secure against cyber threats and compliant with data protection regulations is challenging.
• Scalability and Flexibility: Digital platforms need to be scalable and flexible enough to adapt to the changing needs of government agencies and citizens. This is difficult to achieve as the platform must be designed to handle a large volume of data and provide high accessibility and security.
• User Acceptance: The success of a digital platform often relies on user acceptance. Especially in countries where the trust in government and government services can be low, this can lead to significant challenges.
• User Adoption: Government digital platforms are often rolled out to a wide range of users, including citizens and businesses, with different levels of technical sophistication. Ensuring the platform is intuitive, easy to use, and meets all users’ needs is challenging.
• Data Governance: When various agencies contribute data to a digital platform, it becomes crucial to establish data governance protocols to ensure consistency, accuracy, and completeness of the data. This is a difficult task requiring collaboration among multiple agencies and stakeholders.
• Change Management: Digital platforms are continuously evolving, and it is vital to have a well-defined change management process in place to ensure that updates and changes are made to the platform in a controlled and coordinated manner. This can be difficult as it requires multiple stakeholders’ involvement and buy-in from all parties.

Tips for designing a successful digital platform

Most of the successful platform implementations share some of the same characteristics. I will share some tips about how to create successful platforms. If you want to read more about creating and scaling platforms, then I recommend my other article: 

Guide on starting and scaling platforms – The challenges of growing networks

1. Find the “hard side” of your platform – Most government platforms only work when many agencies work together. For governments, the “hard side” of the platform might be to attract and retail all agencies and give them incentives to leverage the platform by collaborating and integrating their services.
2. Focus on user experience (UX) – UX encompasses developing, prototyping, and refining an interactive platform to fit the user’s needs. This involves research into target audiences and their needs, exploring the competitive landscape (or examples from the industry), designing the overall look and feel of the platform, and regularly testing its usability with users to iterate and improve.
3. Leverage data-driven insights to inform decisions – Utilize analytics tools such as A/B testing to understand how users interact with a platform or pages on the forum, what features or changes produce positive or negative outcomes, and how relevant content can be crafted to increase engagement.
4. Don’t do too much at once – Most government platforms fail because they are too broad, the offerings are not defined well, and it is “all but nothing” simultaneously. Try to focus on the most significant pain points of your citizens first. This can include identity management, central notifications, reminders, or even online consulting. Start small and grow big.

Promoting an e-Government platform

There are thousands of ways to promote digital platforms among citizens and other stakeholders. Traditional methods include television, radio, or print advertising using the latest digital channels like social media, search engine optimization (SEO), and influencer marketing.

But more than this might be needed to promote it. Real promotion happens with the integration into daily tasks. The more contact points you create, the better. If you make it so easy for them to book an offline appointment by using the platform, then promote this. Therefore, you must consider your target audience’s needs and how the platform can help them achieve them. Also, providing customer service and an FAQ page is essential. Finally, creating a feedback loop is crucial for constantly improving the digital government platform and driving users’ engagement.

So it is not just about how much you talk about it, but also how actively you use it. Build your services in the future “digital first” and remind the citizens that it is easier to make it online than offline. Government digital platforms can become a central point of contact for many citizens, businesses, and even the economy if the “digital first” approach is deliberately put to the attention of future policies, future agency work, objectives, KPIs, and everything else.

This requires the right attitude from all stakeholders and backing from the top and bottom.

Examples of unified digital government platforms

Within the last years, several governments have pushed to digitalize their offerings fully and switch to a “digital first” approach where all new services and offerings from governments are thought of first digitally. Here are some examples of different countries:

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom’s GOV.UK platform provides citizens with access to services, information, and support related to public administration, health, education, and more. It also offers an API, allowing third-party developers to create their own apps that link directly to the platform.

India

The Indian Government implemented its flagship “Digital India” platform in 2015 to transform the country into a digitally empowered society and knowledge economy. The platform provides citizens access to numerous services, such as healthcare, education, and banking.

Estonia

The Estonian Government has developed an integrated government platform called X-Road that enables the secure sharing of information between different public sector entities and private service providers, resulting in better service delivery for citizens. It facilitates communication between organizations over a secure connection and uses identity verification tools to ensure user data privacy and security.

South Korea

South Korea’s Digital Government Initiative is an ambitious project that seeks to bring all government services together under one single platform that the public across various devices can access. It allows users to manage tasks such as filing taxes and requesting public services online with just a few clicks.

Highlight key considerations when creating and maintaining a digital platform for governments, such as data security and privacy, user experience, and data protection compliance and more. One of the reasons South Korea ranks second in the international e-Government Development Index (EGDI).

Security and privacy of digital government platforms

Security and privacy are critical considerations when promoting a digital platform for governments. Citizens must trust that their data is safe and secure, or they will not use the platform. Data privacy measures should be implemented by design, with security protocols and encryption standards in place to ensure maximum protection of user data. However, there may be times when governments make decisions based solely on data security concerns, which can halt progress on the project. It is essential to balance the need for high levels of security and privacy with the platform’s ongoing development so that citizens can take full advantage of its benefits.

Conclusion

E-Government platforms, so-called Digital Government Technology Platforms (DGTPs), provide numerous benefits, including increased convenience, improved collaboration, cutting costs, potential new services, or more streamlined service offerings. It is essential to focus on user experience and prioritize data security and privacy throughout these platforms’ design, management, and promotion to ensure public trust and widespread adoption. By doing so, governments can ensure that their citizens can take full advantage of these platforms’ potential. They leverage a better offering while simultaneously decreasing bureaucracy and increasing the service level.

Despite this, it is essential to mention that creating platforms is one of the most complex and challenging processes, and all the parts must play well together. Focusing on the “hard side” of the platform will be crucial. For governments, this hard side means government agencies, and it is bureaucracy and hidden interests from all stakeholders that follow an optimization strategy for their own good. Therefore, robust change management needs to ensure that the new processes, new services, collaboration, and integrations are working together and that no vested interests interfere with the implementation.

Benjamin Talin

Benjamin Talin, a serial entrepreneur since the age of 13, is the founder and CEO of MoreThanDigital, a global initiative providing access to topics of the future. As an influential keynote speaker, he shares insights on innovation, leadership, and entrepreneurship, and has advised governments, EU commissions, and ministries on education, innovation, economic development, and digitalization. With over 400 publications, 200 international keynotes, and numerous awards, Benjamin is dedicated to changing the status quo through technology and innovation. #bethechange Stay tuned for MoreThanDigital Insights - Coming soon!