Partner Article

Innovating towards a more digital government

Tijl Vuyk, CEO and founder of Redwood Software discusses the Government Department for Work and Pensions plans to spend £1.3m on staff to manually check data

The public sector has committed to considerable investments in technology over the past few months, with plans to digitise court rooms and make the NHS paperless, as they seek to make the most of the resources available to them. Therefore, plans by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) to employ more than 100 staff to manually check data at a cost of £1.3m seems to be a backward step in an austere time when companies should be investing in tools to enable efficiency.

With reports of delays in developing the IT system for Universal Credit, it’s understandable that the government wants to commit to a high level of data checks in order to quash rumours of major problems behind the scenes. The success of the Universal Credit scheme now hinges on having up-to-the-minute, accurate data on claimants and their applications. However, as new technologies emerge and the workplace becomes ever more complex, streamlining business processes will be of the utmost importance.

While an increase in manual checks may seem like an effective solution to the government’s current predicament, it dramatically increases the likelihood of inserting human error into the system, which could, in turn, fuel further delays. With pressure on the public sector to display efficiency and results, automation is surely a far more reliable option.

The DWP should look to make the most of the resources it does have, streamlining and automating processes to increase efficiency in the long-term. If the government goes ahead with its plans to employ manual labour, and creates new, short-term processes, it is far more likely to hinder the success of high priority projects like Universal Credit. Process automation, on the other hand, achieves greater efficiency and reduces costs, while you still maintain full control of your processes; it boosts business efficiency and the bottom line by developing a new generation of skilled workers.

As more companies get behind the new industrial revolution and search for tools to streamline their business models, the DWP is under pressure to innovate in order to stay competitive. If they chose to automate, the government will not only be able to collect more reliable data, but it will also make better use of human resource as workers can direct their energies into creative and strategic tasks that rely on human innovation. The DWP needs to consider the best way to achieve more with less if it wants to strengthen, streamline and ultimately grow to keep the public happy over the coming months and years.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Tijl Vuyk .