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CLIENT CASE STUDY

Sardinia labor ministry: Transforming public employment services

Accenture helped the Regional Labor Ministry of Sardinia design and implement the Sardinian Labor Information System (SIL Sardinia).

Overview

The Sardinia Region economy was hit hard by the global slowdown of the late 2000s. Per capita income declined and unemployment touched 14 percent. This spurred the Regional Labor and Vocational Training Ministry to launch a broad transformation program focused on reorganizing as well as creating innovative regional labor and unemployment services.

The Regional Ministry recognized Accenture’s crossfunctional skills in client-specific solutions, our deep understanding of the employment and training fields, and extensive experience in developing complex IT systems as the clear winner for executing the strong change management program it was about to embark on.

Sardinia, the second biggest island in the Mediterranean, is one of the five autonomous regions of Italy with a population of less than 1.7 million. The Sardinian economy is driven by the tertiary sector, especially tourism, the main industry. The regional government of Sardinia administers eight provinces and 377 municipalities and has legislative and administrative powers in health, labor, tourism, social assistance and transportation.

Opportunity
Seeking human services industry and technology experience, and a comprehensive strategy and implementation perspective, the Regional Labor Ministry decided to award a contract to a consortium led by Accenture to design and implement SIL Sardinia, an integrated IT system that would in time become the main support system for all government policy decisions relating to the labor market. This transformation program had two objectives:

  • Building new cultural paradigms in the regional workforce by moving from a purely bureaucratic mindset to a customer-centric operation.

  • Creating an integral information system that allows interoperation of the ministry as well as every stakeholder of the regional labor market, including students, employers, training and employment agencies and trade unions.

Solution

Working closely with the Regional Ministry, Accenture performed process and organization redesign of the regional employment agencies to streamline the widest public employment services network in Italy.

SIL Sardinia was designed to have four components:

  • An Internet portal, Sardegna Lavoro, for e-government services.

  • A back-office intranet portal—Monitor Web—for the management, monitoring and analysis of regional labor policies and their effect on employment growth.

  • A complex and integrated technology platform based on a single database with capacity for holding information on up to 1,300,000 workers and 75,000 employers.

  • A data exchange section that allowed linking up with other related government systems, including the National Labor Ministry, the National Institute for Social Security, and the National Economy and Finance Ministry.

These components would cater to the stakeholders through the following focus areas:

  • Employment contracts data management (employers).

  • Monitoring and analysis of the results of Regional Labor Plan initiatives.

  • Regional qualification framework dedicated to individuals and employers.

  • Agency certification service, to give access to public funded training courses.

  • Online services to enter the administrative process for action financed by the European Social Fund.

  • Job search and state-of-the-art matching services (job placement bodies, employers and job seekers).

  • Lifelong learning services for employed workers to improve their adaptability in changing market conditions.

  • Regional labor observatory services that give access to detailed statistical information on the labor market.

  • Social security services dedicated to enterprises involved in crisis situations, trade unions and laid-off workers

  • Labor data management services (students, employed, unemployed and laid-off workers as well as public and private employers).

  • Vocational training services for the unemployed to facilitate first or new employment (apprenticeship) and prevent “school non-attendance” and/or “early school leaving.”

Results

Today, SIL represents one of the most evolved experiences relating to process and technology innovation in public bodies in Italy. It has enabled:

  • Shared IT systems among participants in the Regional Labor Network—51 local departments with up to 1,300 users (public employees).

  • A regional virtual labor market based on a sophisticated job matching engine—more than 390,000 biodatas are in the process of being matched.

  • A monitoring body to analyze the performance of employment services and evaluate the employment impact of policies (such as business incentives).

  • Organization of the employment system and quality standardization of public labor and employment services—around 1,300 citizens served every day.

  • Modernization and digitalization of administrative procedures relating to labor and unemployment services, significantly easing the burden of 55,000 transactions carried out on average in a month.

  • Easier and equal-opportunity access for citizens to the e-government services–an average of 62,000 monthly employment contracts communicated and about 8,000 vocational training courses managed.

The new labor information system allows the Regional Ministry to boost its efficiency, flexibility and responsiveness to change. It now has the ability, tools and associated application systems needed to manage its business processes more effectively, ultimately enhancing its ability to achieve high performance.

“Accenture has distinguished itself by its high-quality performance, defined by extreme accuracy in project design and execution and a remarkably committed approach to labor and educational issues,” said Emerenziana Silenu, head of the SIL Sardinia Program and the Employment Development Department, Labor and Vocational Training Ministry, Sardinia Region. "I would also like to underline the focus it placed on change management activities, helping to transform the regional labor bodies. Accenture experts have shown a capacity to understand both the cultural and social project impacts, allowing public employees to use their best capabilities to reach the goal of change.

For the complex and structured nature of the program as well as for the methodology and solutions adopted by Accenture, SIL Sardinia has been acknowledged as a best practice by the European Commission, a fact of immense satisfaction and pride for the Regional Government of Sardinia,” Silenu added.