eAdministration
In comparison with eBusiness initiatives, the public sector seems to be a generation behind when it comes to modernising administrative and other practices, and making best use of information technologies. Why is this?Public Goods
In contrast to the private sector, there is no profit-based business driver that influences the priorities of a public administration. Further, the "goods", or products of the public sector's work tend to be "public goods" rather than being business assets for sale with a market value. These factors tend to have a limiting effect on moves to invest in information technologies.
On the other hand, demands for public, universal, accessibility of information and services mean that public administrations are increasingly called upon to make the most of web-based technologies (for online interaction with citizens and businesses) as well as technologies that improve "back-office" delivery of those services. Unlike (at least some parts of) the private sector, public institutions also have to provide a stable, legally-valid, point of reference, for example, as a pointer to laws and regulations in force.
Information and service access
Increasingly, we are seeing public administrations around the globe subscribe to the philosophy first espoused by several US government agencies, that of "no wrong door": wherever citizens start a search for answers and information to a particular problem, they should find a solution, rather than being redirected to another service. Portal technologies have helped a little in this approach. However, we are also seeing a growth of "portal of portals" services, that would indicate that theire is a problem! What is clearly needed is some supplement to "classic" menu-driven and search-based information access systems. the growth of knowledge management policies and technologies will obviously be key to providing long term solutions for administrations in this field.
Furthermore, public administrations are expected to be reliable, trusted sources of information. This will require investment by the public sector in technologies and policies that can allow them to make strong and verifiable assertions about the information they carry. Whether in the field of digital signatures, knowledge management, or elsewhere, such trusted assertions will be key to underpinning an information architecture in which the public can place confidence.
Interoperability
One important challenge, particularly in a global climate of public expenditure restrictions and cuts, must be to improve economies of scale. By centring information architecture strategy on public, open standards, administrations should be able to improve interoperability between different systems and ensure that re-useability of data as well as systems becomes a reality.
This is particularly important also with the increased dependency of the public sector on externally contracted work. Rather than concentrating effort on what their contractors are putting in any given "black box", public administrations should focus their efforst on ensuring that services that they are contracting and paying for, meet requirements for interoperability at the key nodes and interfaces with other systems, whether these be technical, operational or semantic interoperability points.