In today’s rapidly evolving technological landscape, government leaders face the challenge of embracing emerging technologies while staying focused on their mission and core outcomes. This article serves as a roadmap to help government technology leaders leverage trusted partners to securely inject innovation into their agencies and navigate disruptions caused by emerging tech.
Understanding Emerging Technologies
Current and emerging technologies, such as generative AI and next-generation AI, hold immense potential for transforming government operations. Generative AI offers self-learning capabilities, enabling systems to adapt and improve over time. AI technologies such as “less than one”-shot learning (LO-shot) — which trains an AI on a smaller set of examples than is currently needed — promise disruptive advancements in areas like language processing and decision-making at a fraction of the data, computing power, and economic cost. These advancements bring both opportunities and challenges for government leaders.
Disruptions and Job Impact
Disruptions in the government enterprise are inevitable as emerging technologies mature. Next-generation AI technologies represent a significant disruption by dramatically redefining the capabilities of AI systems.
More specifically, these advancements have the potential to automate routine tasks, enhance decision-making processes, and revolutionize communication and collaboration. Additionally, they may also disrupt certain job roles that are susceptible to automation. Government technology leaders must proactively identify the areas where disruptions will occur and understand the potential impact on jobs and careers.
While automation and AI may replace certain routine tasks, they will also create new opportunities for upskilling and redirecting human resources towards higher-value roles requiring creativity, critical thinking, and emotional intelligence. The time to plan for these disruptions is now, not when they are already happening. This will be critical to positioning your agency appropriately.
Navigating Disruptions
Government technology leaders must adopt a strategic approach to successfully navigate these disruptions. They should collaborate with trusted partners who can provide expertise in secure innovation adoption. This collaboration allows agencies to augment their capabilities while safeguarding sensitive data and maintaining public trust.
By embracing an “adapt and grow” mindset and fostering a culture of continuous learning, leaders can ensure that their teams are equipped to adapt to evolving technological landscapes. It is essential they proactively identify the potential disruptions and prepare the workforce by offering opportunities to learn new skills. This will enable employees to transition into new roles that leverage the unique capabilities of emerging technologies.
Maximizing the Outcomes and Benefits
Emerging technologies offer immense benefits for government agencies in delivering outcomes quicker and more efficiently than in the past. Government leaders should identify the areas within their agencies where these technologies can have the greatest impact to maximize the outcomes and benefits. This involves conducting thorough assessments of agency processes, operations and service delivery to determine where automation, enhanced decision-making, or improved communication can drive efficiency and effectiveness.
They must leverage the assessments and identify the areas where these technologies can create the greatest impact and prioritize their implementation accordingly. By implementing these technologies in areas that align with agency goals and priorities, they can enhance overall outcomes, increase productivity, and better serve citizens.
Transparency and Building Trust
It is axiomatic that government entities must build stakeholder trust as they adopt emerging technologies. Additionally, transparency, accountability, and ethical considerations are crucial to ensure public confidence in the government. Its leaders should actively engage with stakeholders, including the public, to address concerns and establish clear guidelines for the responsible use of emerging technologies.
It’s also crucial to be transparent about the algorithms used in AI systems. Government technology leaders should ensure that the algorithms are explainable and provide clear insights into how they operate, the data they are trained on, and any potential biases they may carry.
Transparent algorithms enable public scrutiny, promote accountability, and mitigate concerns related to biases or unfair outcomes. By openly sharing information about the algorithms implemented within their agencies, government leaders can foster trust, engage stakeholders, and address any potential ethical or societal implications.
Government technology leaders play a pivotal role in navigating the era of emerging technologies. By embracing trusted partners, they better anticipate the disruptions caused by technologies like next-generation AI such as LO-shot, as well as proactively preparing for the changing workforce landscape.
In summary, government entities can leverage these technologies to enhance their operations, improve service delivery, deliver enhanced outcomes, and drive positive societal impact.
Government technology leaders can successfully steer their agencies towards a future empowered by innovation through strategic collaboration, continuous learning, transparency of algorithms, and a commitment to building trust.
Jonathan Xavier Ozovek is the Chief Transformation Officer of SLED for Iron Bow Technologies. Previously, he was the Chief Operating Officer (COO) of the Virginia Information Technologies Agency (VITA) and Deputy CIO for Virginia. Under his leadership, the state dramatically improved time to market for new services, scaled best-in-class cyber security defenses, launched first-in-the-nation services, and achieved record customer satisfaction while simultaneously saving the Commonwealth over $200 million. In addition, Jonathan specializes in research, development, and innovation with focus in artificial intelligence, predictive analytics, and machine learning and holds patents across multiple industries. He currently has two patents in AI. Additionally, he has invented systems ranging from a predictive commodity trading system to a medical device research and development Enterprise Program Management (EPM) system.
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