Public Service Technology Vision 2015
The 2015 Accenture Technology Vision articulates five trends and what they mean for digital governments seeking to become digital leaders.
A PUBLIC SERVICE PATH TO LEADERSHIP
DAN LONDON
"The Accenture Technology
Vision 2015 affirms that
digital is changing the way
people live and work – and
enabling governments to
deliver public service for
the future."
A DIGITAL GOVERNMENT PERSPECTIVE
Discover how the five Technology Vision trends foreshadow important shifts and opportunities to improve public service performance and citizen satisfaction with digital government services.
PUBLIC SERVICE IS KEEPING PACE
Most executives—including those in public service—expect the pace of technology adoption to increase.
INCREASE OVER THE NEXT TWO YEARS
TREND 1
INTERNET OF ME
Personalized citizen experience is a top-three priority for two out of three pubic service leaders.
What are the key barriers to
personalization in public service?
personalization in public service?
TREND 2
OUTCOME ECONOMY
Most executives agree that digital devices on the edge are powering an outcome economy and enabling a new business model that shifts the focus from selling services to selling outcomes.
Technology offers new means for outcome-focused public services-but few are tapping into its full potential.
TREND 3
PLATFORM (R)EVOLUTION
More than half of public service leaders are embracing Platform as a Service (PaaS) within their organizations.
Public Service expects organizations will move toward real-time platforms and systems as enterprises adopt mobility and Internet of Things solutions.
TREND 4
INTELLIGENT ENTERPRISE
Managing data remains a huge hurdle (“very” or “extremely” challenging) for all industries—including public service.
But public service is making progress—experimenting with or using a range of intelligent technologies.
TREND 5
WORKFORCE REIMAGINED
Public service leaders recognize the importance of intelligent machines.
Successful organizations will manage employees alongside intelligent machines— ensuring collaboration between the two:
And public service is ahead of other industries in considering adoption of software automation or cognitive computing to complement the human workforce.
Five key technology trends: What do they mean for public service?
Forward-thinking public service organizations have already started to embrace the Accenture Technology Vision 2015 trends.
NEW ZEALAND ANSWERS THE CALL FOR DIGITAL TAX SERVICES
Here’s how one revenue agency is tackling digital transformation: from the ground up, with customers at the core.
What does a woodcutter—with a wife, a child and a new baby
on the way—have to do with Inland Revenue’s ambitious vision
for digital tax services? The fictitious woodcutter is one of
numerous customer “personas” New Zealand’s revenue agency
is using as it applies digital technologies to reshape how it
processes tax obligations, determines benefits eligibility and
interacts with taxpayers.
Through examples like the woodcutter, Inland Revenue is
exploring new ways to track taxpayers’ life events. For the
woodcutter, that includes his growing family (which entitles him
to greater tax relief) and his increasing pay (which affects
eligibility for housing subsidies). Historically, taxpayers have
had to manage such changes through a series of disjointed
systems and processes—with many individuals and families
facing steep fines and penalties for unintentional
non-compliance.
Through its sweeping digital transformation, Inland Revenue
aims to change that. The revenue agency is working to build a
new, event-based core system that will reduce the burden of tax
compliance. The platform will put taxpayers at the center of
processes, enabling greater automation and more timely and
coordinated communications. To complement its new core
platform, Inland Revenue is also building a dynamic digital layer
to enable a streamlined customer experience. Single sign-on
and pre-populated personal information will be a welcome
departure from the traditional approach of “Fill out this form, and
we’ll get back to you."
Embracing a ‘digital first’ model
The Accenture Global Taxpayers Survey underscores the need
for customer-centric digital transformation. Nine in ten taxpayers
(91 percent) we surveyed in each country are using online
banking services. They expect similar levels of innovation and
quality of service from their revenue agency—pointing to the
need for digital government services. Yet agencies are
struggling to meet these expectations and continue to engage
with taxpayers through increasingly outdated methods.
In New Zealand, 83 percent of those we surveyed expressed
interest in using an online tax account. Like their taxpaying
peers around the globe, New Zealanders have the appetite,
readiness and trust required to become truly digital customers
of revenue agencies.
Inland Revenue is answering that call. Rather than adding
digital “window dressing” to existing systems or processes, the
revenue agency is doing the hard work of true transformation.
It’s been years in the making—and will take years to complete.
Along the way, Inland Revenue has been engaging with
taxpayers, tax agents, businesses of all sizes and tax software
vendors. The revenue agency is gathering their perspectives,
understanding their pain points and demonstrating a
commitment to using digital technologies to reduce the time and
effort individuals and businesses must expend to address tax
compliance.
It’s an important investment in driving mission productivity and
personalized services—all of which will make life less taxing for
New Zealand’s taxpayers.
INDUSTRY INSIGHTS
Learn what the Technology Vision means for public service across Defense & Public Safety, Human Services and Operations & Management industries.
LEADERSHIP
METHODOLOGY
Every year, the Technology Vision team collaborates with Accenture Research to pinpoint the emerging IT developments that will have the greatest impact on companies, government agencies, and other organizations in the next three to five years.
The research process this year began with gathering inputs from the Technology Vision External Advisory Board, a group comprising of more than two dozen executives and entrepreneurs from the public and private sectors, academia, venture capital and startup companies. In addition, the Technology Vision team conducted nearly 100 interviews with technology luminaries, industry experts and Accenture business leaders.
The team also tapped into the vast pool of knowledge and innovative ideas from professionals across Accenture, using Accenture’s collaboration technologies and a crowdsourcing approach to launch and run an online contest to uncover the most interesting emerging technology themes. Over 1,700 participants actively engaged in the contest, contributing valuable ideas and voting on others’ inputs.
Accenture Technology Vision 2015 Survey Demographics
This year, Accenture conducted the first Technology Vision survey, polling 2,000 business and technology executives—including 162 public service leaders—across nine countries and 10 industries, in order to understand key technology challenges as well as priority investments. The goals: to understand their perspectives on key technology challenges they face, and to identify their priority investments over the next few years. This survey was fielded from December 2014 through January 2015 in Australia, Brazil, China, France, Germany, India, South Africa, the United Kingdom and the United States. Respondents included IT Directors (24 percent), Function Heads (15 percent), CIOs or Chief Mobility Officers (13 percent), CTOs or Directors of Technology (13 percent), CMOs (9 percent), Line of Business Heads (9 percent) and CSOs (4 percent).
To learn more and read the full Accenture Technology Vision 2015 report, please go to:
> accenture.com/technologyvision