This article is an excerpt from GovLoop’s recent report, “Building Digital Workspaces to Meet the Needs of a Changing Government Workforce.” Download the full report here.
Increasing dependence on technology in day-to-day life has prompted governments to reevaluate their workflow processes.
Legacy technologies hinder public sector workers from serving citizen demands because of fragmented and complex workflows. Legacy systems also pose grave security risks; agencies have more endpoints and less visibility into their most important assets.
Moving to digital workspaces allow agencies to keep pace with accelerating citizen demands, as well as streamline workflow processes for government employees.
Below are best practices for moving from legacy applications and desktops to digital workspaces.
1. Evaluate current workflows
Starting off, identify day-to-day workflow inefficiencies at your agency. You might be surprised how many you find: manual data entry, hard-to-track files and wasted time are common pitfalls. Run analyses on replaceable man-hours spent on low- value tasks, such as data reentry, and opportunities for value-add tasks, such as data analysis. Then, see where new efficiencies could improve customer experiences.
2. Talk to your IT and security departments
Engage your IT and security departments to find out what applications truly cost the most to run and maintain and where consolidations are available. If you can consolidate and improve workflows up front, both current and future budget sheets will be easier to balance.
3. Explore cloud options
Chances are, the right cloud solution will be able to host much of the data that you were worried about. More than supporting data, however, see how workflows can be improved, and make sure that you’re going with the right cloud solution. The ideal cloud solution will be scalable and flexible across environments. The ability to layer applications will foster a uniform, cohesive process.
4. Think forward
Although moving to the cloud can have a big impact, it’s in no way an all-or-nothing proposition. The right cloud solution will be scalable, and there’s nothing wrong with starting off with smaller and simpler workflows to tap into its potential. In doing so, you can evaluate the change management process of cloud adoption and evaluate possibilities for improvement, as well as look for future workflows that would be well-suited for cloud migrations.
5. Partner with industry
Industry partners not only give you the keys, but they’ll show you how to drive cloud migration as well. Before adopting cloud, make sure you have the right service by asking for specific offerings and examples. While all cloud solutions should offer the utmost security and scalability, others will offer more in-house customizability at the expense of offered applications.
To learn more about building digital workspaces to rescue public sector workflows, read the full report here.
