Accelerating digital transformation in government

Moving transactions online is not enough — the whole relationship, including transaction, interaction and follow-up, must be digital.

The experience of calling a company and being met with overly complicated voice response systems, long wait times and inane on-hold music has undoubtedly left many frustrated. Customers of government departments are no exception.

Most government customers today are still forced to interact with dated voice response systems or to physically visit a service centre. Essentially, a customer who needs assistance must resign themselves to joining a queue, whether in person or via a 1800 number. The effectiveness of these systems is increasingly being called into question following the experience of Centrelink, where more than 26 million phone calls went unanswered last year. In addition, waiting times averaged a whopping 17 minutes per call. According to the National Audit Office, a crisis of this nature would require another 500 public servants — at an annual cost of $100 million — to reduce waiting times to merely ‘acceptable’ levels. Let’s be honest, not every organisation has such a hefty sum lying around.

A situation like this can be easily solved by adopting digital engagement options to deflect calls to chat messaging instead. This allows a company to handle more customer contacts with the same number of staff.

How Australia’s government stacks up

According to a recent report from EY Sweeney, more than two-thirds of digital opinion leaders and 48% of consumers think Australians are in danger of being left behind when it comes to digitisation, due to government digital policies.

The report cites slow internet speeds, a lack of robust, digital infrastructure, mediocre standards, poor delivery of e-commerce and a lack of innovation as potential factors.

Meanwhile, according to the World Economic Forum’s 2014 Network Readiness index, Australia was ranked just 18th in the world in relation to digital advancement.

These figures are representative of a general government reluctance to seek new digital methods of engagement that will revolutionise how citizens interact with the public sector. In fact, according to Deloitte, Australians undertake more than 800 million transactions with government agencies each year, with around 40% still being completed using traditional (non-digital) channels. If this figure could be reduced to 20% over a 10-year period, Deloitte has estimated productivity, efficiency and other benefits to government will be worth around $17.9 billion — along with savings in time, convenience and out-of-pocket costs to citizens worth a further $8.7 billion.

The cost of digitisation

For most budget-conscious government agencies, a key barrier to digital adoption is the perceived additional cost. However, what most organisations do not realise is that introducing a digital engagement platform actually enables customer care professionals to be more productive without increasing their workload. It also enables customers to be guided to self-serve options more easily.

As a result, in terms of costs, a self-serve digital transaction is almost 50 times cheaper for organisations than a face-to-face transaction. According to Deloitte, online transactions cost just 40 cents compared to telephone transactions, which sit at $6.60. At the same time, the online channel can produce transaction volumes of 490 million per year, while telephone and face-to-face sit at just 139 million and 84.1 million respectively.

Completing the transformation

For departments and agencies wanting to increase their digital transaction volumes, the key is to handle as many simple requests as possible through digital means, such as real-time messaging, contextual content and phone deflection. Then, those departments and agencies can have visibility on more complex requests to see which ones can also be handled digitally.

This strategy might require more advanced tools such as co-browsing, which enables the customer care professional to see the customer’s screen and guide the customer through their journey in a secure manner. It even allows the professional to help the customer fill out a form, while masking sensitive data from being seen or recorded; and video share, to push a ‘how to’ video to assist the customer. All of these journeys can no doubt be handled more efficiently online than by telephone or at a service centre.

Instilling a digital mentality

One of the biggest challenges of going digital within the public sector is organisational inertia. Human nature both on a personal and organisational level exhibits the following traits: resistance to change, tribalism and an internal focus. Government needs to set these aside and commit to a new digital relationship with users.

Those in charge have to get past the tribalism associated with the thinking ‘I’ll just do this for my department’ and contemplate a user’s entire relationship with government. Finally, achieving a true digital transformation requires government to put the user at the very centre, rather than focusing on what it thinks is best or easiest to complete.

Moving transactions online is not enough. The whole relationship, including transaction, interaction and follow-up, must be digital. Government must remember this is not a one-time transformation — it is an ongoing commitment to a digital relationship.

Image courtesy Matt Reinbold under CC