Improving government-service delivery

Rohan Samarajiva

Yangon, 22 June 2016

This work was carried out with the aid of a grant from the International Development Research Centre, Canada and the Department for International Development UK..

What do citizens want?

• Interact with government and obtain government services in most convenient way– When they want

• No office hours

– Without travel• No co-presence

– Without confusion and delays• “No door is wrong”

– Without intermediaries, corrupt or otherwise

– For all citizens, including differently abled & illiterate

2

First: Review & simplify

• Conditions have changed, but we continue with old, sometimes colonial, procedures out of inertia

– Example: Arrival & Departure Cards in age of machine-readable passports and electronic travel authorizations

• If South Africa has got rid of them, why would anyone need them

3

Second: A simple single door

Government contact center

Web Interface 2 Web Interface n

Citizens | Industry | IGOs | Diaspora | CSOs

CONTACT

CENTER

Govt entity 1

Web Interface 1

Govt entity nGovt entity 2

Not web OR voice, but web AND voice; supplemented by common access centers for specialized functions & special groups

Even in smartphonerich New York City, 50,000 calls are made every day.

• USD 46 million a year to operate

(because of high NYC salaries)

• 306 full-time operators, handling

an average of 90 calls per shift

• More than 50,000 calls a day on

average

• 3600 pieces of information

retrieved from database

• Preparing the database is the

Most important activity; part of

reengineering government

• “No door is wrong” except for 911

(but even here calls will be redirected)

New York City 311 Call Center

Looks simple but is not

• Start with a simple information service

– Who is responsible for what?

– Where is the relevant official located?

– What are the office hours?

– What is the phone number from which more information can be obtained?

• But as quickly as possible, the service must be enhanced

7

Proven technology; declining costs

• Call center requires specialized equipment for handling multiple incoming calls, for tracking service requests, evaluating the interactions and so on

• By 2014, nearly 300 cities and counties in US had a 311 call system or use the underlying technology, known as customer relationship management (CRM) – Initially only the biggest cities could afford the technology

and the roomful of operators needed to answer the calls

– But as technology costs dropped and the capabilities increased, smaller municipalities began using 311

8

Frontend

• But most importantly, it means that the calls are responded to by operators trained to be polite and pleasant

– They cannot have specialist knowledge about the subject matter of the calls

– Their answers must be consistent

– They must quickly retrieve the necessary information from databases while the call is in progress

9

Backend

• Accurate, up-to-date information on government services under the authority of the Region must be available in the data base– Detailed information that is in the books and in

the heads of the “subject clerks” has to be collected and stored in easily retrievable form, i.e., in computer systems

– There must be a continuous effort to develop answers to the FAQs [Frequently Asked Questions] and to keep the information current

10

Third: Go beyond voice

• The common backend can support multiple frontends

11

12

Multiple ways of accessing

Fourth: More

• Two related mobile apps being used in Boston

– Citizens Connect is a simple app that allows people to submit geotagged photos of potholes, graffiti or other visible problems and then track the status of the city's response

– Its internal equivalent is City Worker. Now used by all of the city's public-works employees, the app not only directs them to problem spots but also allows them to open new cases in the field.

13

What calls to New York City 311 are about through the day

Big data from call centers (& web inquiries) can help improve services

• Can serve as diagnostics to identify geographical areas with problems and also particular services

• Can drive resource allocations

• Can also provide geo-spatial clues to identify problems and solutions

16