The Cabinet Office has recently released its 2007 Report into Transformational Government, which makes encouraging reading. The Report, which can be accessed at www.cio.gov.uk, shows real progress across public service delivery, with an emerging, pan-governmental vision of its IT architecture, a clear shift towards citizen-centred services, and a broad variety of shared functions in operation, principally in finance, procurement and HR. Such achievements demonstrate an increasingly mature understanding amongst government and its suppliers of the need for common standards across various dimensions of IT – including strategy and architecture, processes, data, the government’s IT estate, skills, and the measurement of IT services.
Yet many challenges remain. Defining blueprints for shared services is one thing – but persuading people to standardise on these, often at the expense of their own autonomy, can be quite another. We note, for example, that the Report shows that few departments have succeeded thus far in sharing their IT function. And yet continued efficiencies and savings across the public sector IT estate will require a relentless focus on standardisation and re-use: on common processes, interfaces and standards – often in the face of ‘not invented here’ syndrome.
Delivery continues to be another ongoing challenge. A recent government-funded study identified widespread overspending in the procurement of outsourced IT services – and in a recent interview, the Government CIO himself acknowledges that it may be possible to save £100 on each of 4 million PCs currently in use within government. At Methods we believe that such savings will not be possible for as long as government continues to show a preference for large-scale, top-down monolithic IT contracts that are inflexible and prescriptive. The usual reason given is that procurement costs are lower, but at the cost of on going competition? We think that the benefits achievable through on-going competitive pressures usually outweigh the additional procurement costs. It also allows for change and innovation that longer term contracts do not. There is also a continual delivery pressure that is not felt by companies that have long term departmental contracts.
Recent devolvement of responsibilities within the NHS National Programme demonstrates that the achievement of sustainable value within contracts demands locally managed responsibility, and frequent break points and renewals. The issue, of course, is how this can be achieved alongside increasing commonality of standards and re-use?
There is no reason why the benefits of a shared architecture, standards and services should require large traditional contracts. By insisting on open procurement principles within truly open architectures, the Government CIO has a real opportunity to realise widespread savings whilst supporting UK plc – and to reap the benefits offered by innovative SMEs. ‘Standard’ does not automatically mean ‘large’ (which also often also means expensive).
As our name implies, Methods Consulting has been promoting the take up of common methods, standards, and approaches across all of these dimensions since our inception in 1990. Such methods and standards are the key enablers for transformational government – and our consultants are seeing continued, strong demand for their experienced know-how in this vital area. In addition to working ’behind the scenes’ on the client side to join up government services, we also provide such services on a ‘one stop shop’ basis – often in areas where we are able to bring fresh thinking or a new perspective on ways in which these can be best delivered.
We welcome the real progress showcased in the CIO’s Report, and look forward to continuing our work in joining up services during the coming year.