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Public Service

Five areas of focus for better public service experience

September 28, 2022 5-MINUTE READ

Addressing complexity can require large-scale transformation that takes time and money. To help make the experience transformation journey more digestible, we have outlined short and longer-term actions to help public service agencies deliver on people’s expectations for simplicity, humanity and security across five fundamental areas.

Make strategic and situational choices in how your agency uses digital tools to serve people and improve the employee experience.

The quick wins

  • Conduct an experience assessment to understand how people are using channels to interact with your agency.
  • Begin to standardize an approach to digital identity in your branch of government.
  • Assess how your employees use digital tools and channels to do their jobs—what’s working and what’s not.

The long game

  • Track emerging concepts
  • Collaborate with partner agencies to further develop digital identity applications
  • Empower in-person, hybrid and remote employees

Invite input from people to develop public service experiences that are based on understanding, not assumptions. 

The quick wins

  • Develop service exit surveys to gather people’s feedback on their experiences and make plans to act on their input. 
  • Commit to human-centered design to improve experiences, seeking input from end users and frontline workers.
  • Explore more ways to solicit feedback from people, such as digital journaling, focus groups, task tracking and IVR tree testing.

The long game

  • Establish communication channels between the public and agencies; use community-based organizations to expand outreach.
  • Embed human-centered design as a natural part of projects, improving results with ongoing employee training and funding.
  • Create a human-centered design studio with a cross-disciplinary team with expertise in everything from design and behavioral psychology to data analysis.

Prepare the workforce with the skills they need to work in new ways, while growing their confidence and engagement.

The quick wins

  • Complete a workforce skills assessment to understand the skills gaps in your workforce and pinpoint training needs.
  • Triage training needs for staff and leadership, offering immediate solutions for priority skills gaps.
  • Understand what your employees value about their jobs and determine how to help them do the work they love in a diverse and inclusive workplace.  

The long game

  • Broaden access to training through partnerships with colleges and universities.
  • Evolve training experiences to make them more immersive with virtual reality, and ultimately, via training in the metaverse.
  • Create more opportunities for employees in your agency to work on purpose-driven and meaningful work by automating repetitive tasks. 

Bring a whole of government approach to service delivery grounded in “how people live” rather than “how government is structured.” 

The quick wins

  • Identify the technology and policy barriers standing in the way of building key partnerships. 
  • Explore and pilot non-traditional partnerships with private sector players to improve experiences.
  • Audit public information with partners to ensure messages reflect what people need from government, not how government is structured. 

The long game

  • Work with key partners to develop a roadmap to successful cross-agency partnerships.
  • Streamline administrative operations where possible and codify ways of working with private sector partners.
  • Develop shared content practices and standards and centralize content development where possible to eliminate siloing of information within agencies.

Build people’s confidence, awareness and understanding of what programs are available—and what they need to do to receive them, while focusing on equitable access and reach.

The quick wins

  • Assess your agency’s digital effectiveness with targeted usability studies.
  • Audit the way that digital content is produced as well as reporting processes in your agency.

The long game

  • Use data insights and analytics to deliver highly relevant content to specific audiences across all channels.
  • Establish policies and approaches to centralize marketing, including content production and analytics.
  • Continually optimize content across channels for clarity and consistency and to address changes in audience needs and attitudes.

It's an exciting time for agencies to approach public service experiences through a new lens, making them more simple, human and secure.

About the Authors

Eyal Darmon

Managing Director – Strategy & Consulting, Public Service

Kevin Ellenwood

Managing Director – Accenture Song, Public Service Customer Experience

Jenny Brodie

Senior Manager – Health & Public Service, Research

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