“In that circumstance, all these agencies, like the Coast Guard and TSA (Transportation Security Administration) and Customs, Immigration, and FEMA and the Secret Service, all reported through separate chains of command to the president, had separate statutory authorities … with separate appropriations…. And that made it basically impossible to get all of the different agencies acting in harmony, in concert.”—Richard Falkenrath, former homeland security policy advisor to the president (2001–2003) and deputy homeland security advisor with the Department of Homeland Security (2003–2004), discussing the challenges associated with disparate governmental

agencies on PBS’s Frontline.

The Current State of Shared Services

It is clear as we witness urgent situations around the world—and even live day to day—that governmental operations and civilians’ lives are growing increasingly complex. From emergency response management to the efficient provision of community-based services, the need for interconnected communications and services has never been greater.

Today, most information and processes exist in isolated agency silos, causing disadvantages for government divisions as well as for the citizens and businesses they serve. Such pronounced lack of information and resource sharing among individual departments hampers effectiveness at all levels—which is why improving operational efficiency and effectiveness now ranks as a top goal for governments worldwide.

For governments, lack of sharing leads to redundant efforts and investments. In fact, in Europe, back-office functions consume 25 percent of government budgets, compared to just 10 percent for private-sector companies.1 For citizens and businesses, lack of sharing among agencies complicates interactions with government. A citizen who changes address needs to individually update records associated with motor vehicle registration, schools, property taxes, libraries, voter registration, and others. Similarly, a business that wants to expand often has to individually contact public works, public safety, the tax administration, and other agencies.

Global government-transformation initiatives recognize the crucial role technology plays in enabling the sharing that improves government efficiency, citizen services, and public safety. By sharing overlapping IT infrastructure, information systems, and other vital resources, governments reduce costs and increase their reach and responsiveness.

In early 2005, Accenture sought views about shared services from more than 140 senior executives at all levels of governments across 13 countries in Europe, North America, the Asia Pacific region, and Africa. Their findings: 85 percent said they believe that shared services are playing or will play a role in supporting their organizations' strategic goals. In addition, two-thirds (66 percent) of the government executives reported that they had already implemented, or were in the process of implementing, shared services.

Cisco Connected Government

The Fully Connected Government: Harnessing the Power of Shared Services to Integrate and Enable All Levels of Agencies

Cisco Connected Government

Opportunities and Rewards

Opportunities for Sharing

Teaming with ifour, a company that researches federal government IT topics, Cisco Systems® has identified four categories of government sharing:

• Intra-agency and interagency collaboration—By implementing interoperable communications such as IP telephony, videoconferencing systems, and contact centers, individuals in disparate agencies using disparate communications systems can collaborate freely and effectively, improving public safety and support for constituent services.

• Infrastructure sharing—Agencies share physical resources and equipment such as computers, buildings, incident command vehicles, and other costly assets, dramatically cutting expenses and redundancies.

• Information sharing—Secure access to other agencies’ information systems further facilitates intra-agency and interagency collaboration and is especially compelling for agencies involved with public safety. Law enforcement agencies, for example, become more effective when they can cross-reference information not only in their own databases, but also in those of other public safety organizations.

• Services sharing—Agencies improve efficiency and reduce costs when they share noncore business functions, such as human resources, accounting, and centralized information and communications technology services, among others. Service-oriented architectures make service sharing much easier to implement.

Agency and Community Benefits from Sharing

Shared services deliver measurable benefits. In a 2004 study, government agencies from eight European countries that implemented e-government best practices experienced an average of three to seven times greater improvement in 12 operating metrics related to productivity compared to organizations that did not follow best practices.2

From improved efficiency to enhanced public safety, benefits include:

• Improved emergency response—Public safety increases when first-responder agencies and other government organizations can share information, such as video feeds, building blueprints, or hazardous materials databases—and also communicate across disparate voice and radio systems.

• Improved citizen access to government services and communications—Agencies that can provide convenient access to services using the Web, kiosks, telephones, or some other channel—delivering consistent information no matter the contact method—increase citizen service levels.

• More effective resource management—By sharing noncore business functions with other agencies, government organizations can free up human resources to focus on their core business.

• Integration of multiple levels of government—Integrating agencies and departments at different levels of government enables automated processes. For example, a regional finance authority that can access local authorities’ information online eliminates delay and the risk of error associated with reentering information into another system.

Taking Action to Become a Connected Government

Identifying the Vision

For government organizations to make shared services a successful reality, they must first consider the vision of a connected government. Characteristics include:

• Controlled flow of information across agencies to help ensure data privacy and collaborative electronic workflow

• More convenient constituent access to government services anytime, anywhere, and through any channel, including Web, phone, and in person

• Enhanced, cost-effective constituent outreach

• Interactive relationships between constituents and government to improve the relevance and effectiveness of services

• Reliable, accurate, and timely information easily accessed by all stakeholders in real time

In addition, connected government is based on three key tenets of an intelligent information network:

• Ability to integrate the network with evolving applications and network components

• Ability to build in resilience to maintain continuity and performance

• Ability to adapt to changing needs of government programs

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Cisco Connected Government

Assessing Systems in Place and Evaluating Needs

Before moving forward, government organizations need a detailed understanding of the strengths and limitations of their existing infrastructures. Agencies determine the actions needed to achieve connected government status by performing internal, subjective assessments as well as objective assessments from Cisco® or third parties (Table 1).

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Table 1 First Steps to Connecting Government: Assessing the Current State

Subjective Assessment Objective Assessment

What it is

A step-by-step methodology that guides agencies through a self-assessment of their networks, based on best practices

A detailed technical evaluation that considers systems in place while assessing specific deliverables and actions that will bridge the gap between existing infrastructure and one that will achieve desired objectives

Who performsAgency Cisco or another third party

Process

Identify organizational capabilities and objectives, demographics served, technologies in use, and desired capabilities

Compare existing network capabilities against relevant benchmarks and peers’ capabilities

Assess whether existing network elements provide the scalability and adaptability needed for connected government

Evaluate existing network’s health and capabilities in the context of stated objectives

Develop a strategic plan to quickly and easily integrate new applications into the network

Deliverables

Report detailing strengths and existing risks or vulnerabilities

Business justification for network improvements

Recommendations to:

• Thwart risks and minimize vulnerabilities • Strengthen security• Enhance stability• Capitalize on existing resources for greater efficiency• Achieve needed network performance

Customized roadmap to guide agency to connected government status

Subjective assessments can reveal a lack of network resiliency, which can compromise capabilities such as public emergency notification and field worker communication. An objective assessment can then take that information and move the agency forward along the road to a connected government.

Cisco Connected Government

With a staff of 5,500 police officers serving a population of 1.6 million, Kent Police wanted to meet the United Kingdom’s Best Value performance targets, such as improving communication and interaction with the community and delivering more value for tax dollars.

Kent Police achieved its goals by replacing outdated private branch exchange systems in 55 police stations with a single IP network providing voice, video, and data. The department immediately reduced communications costs by 30 percent and expects return on investment within four years.

Communications with the community have improved because of IP telephony features such as advanced contact centers. Departmental productivity has also increased, a result of capabilities such as a unified messaging system, which enables personnel to check both e-mail and voicemail from either the e-mail inbox or telephone.

Following a Network Roadmap Using a Phased Approach

Agencies typically work toward shared services and connected government in incremental phases, avoiding disruption and trying to ensure uninterrupted service delivery. The Connected Government roadmap, based on Cisco’s Service-Oriented Network Architecture (SONA), helps agencies to evolve from being “siloed,” virtually disconnected entities, to fully connected organizations that extract full value by securely sharing resources, information, and services. Phases 1 through 3 facilitate intra-agency sharing and phases 4 through 6 enable interagency sharing.

Phase 1: Siloed Information and Communication Systems— Limited and Linear

Most government agencies today operate as independent silos. Information and communications are insulated. A single network failure can disable access to records and logistics systems, jeopardizing government continuity and responsiveness. Furthermore, public safety agencies’ radio systems do not interoperate with the voice system at headquarters or other radio systems, inhibiting interagency collaboration.

Phase 2: Intra-agency Collaboration—Evolving and Expanding

In phase 2, governments deploy a single, standards-based IP network that can deliver voice, video, and data to anyone in the agency. The network is highly available and secure, enabling continuous communications even in the event of a failure. With intra-agency collaboration enabled at this point, agencies can utilize or share fixed and dedicated assets regardless of their location or affiliation. Without secure VPN connectivity, however, mobile operations continue to lack the ability to stream real-time information.

Phase 3: Integrated Remote Resources—One by One

In this phase, agencies provide secure remote access for mobile workers and private sector partners over a VPN. Fully integrated into the network, the remote workforce can send and receive real-time enterprise data. Examples of new capabilities include event-based video surveillance (triggered by noise or movement, for example) over a wired or wireless IP network and interoperable communications between wireline phones and land-mobile radio networks.

Phase 4: Interagency Collaboration—Group by Group

In phase 4, interoperability is further extended. After integrating their own departments, agencies can begin integrating other regional counterparts into the network. Disparate groups can collaborate using voice conferencing and videoconferencing and Web collaboration.

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Serving 30,000 residents, the Upper Merion Township Police Department was hampered by an aging records management system (RMS). The department’s patrol officers now use an outdoor wireless network solution from their patrol vehicles to file reports electronically, update the database in real time, and download information from the RMS. This avoids time spent driving to the office to retrieve information or file reports. Supervisors at headquarters can view video transmitted over the network from in-vehicle cameras, increasing situational awareness, visibility, and officer safety.

Phase 3 in Action: Upper Merion Township Police Department, Pennsylvania, United States

Phase 2 in Action: Kent Police, United Kingdom

Cisco Connected Government

Phase 5: Interagency Infrastructure Sharing—Removing the Barriers

In phase 5, agencies connect their data center facilities so they can securely share common infrastructure such as disk storage, network capacity, IP telephony capacity, computer-processing power, and information. Sharing infrastructure enables secure information exchange among agencies in accordance with policies and regulations. It also reduces the costs of data centers and network redundancy required for continuous government operations. To help ensure that agencies experience expected performance levels, governments can define policies regarding each agency’s consumption of bandwidth, storage, processing, and other shared infrastructure.

Phase 6: Connected Government—Enabled and Effective Sharing

In the final phase of connected government, agencies can use their secure, resilient networks and enjoy complete collaboration that transcends agency boundaries. In the fully connected phase, network and communications applications are in place to allow secure sharing of information and services such as financial management, human resources management, and centralized IT management. This sharing of applications and services allows agencies to improve their responsiveness while conforming to regulatory and policy standards that help ensure quality.

Helping to Connect Governments Worldwide

Cisco has implemented end-to-end network solutions around the world, helping governments to connect and empower their agencies.

• Industry-leading technical expertise—For more than 20 years, Cisco has led the way in networking, providing comprehensive, integrated, and secure IP networks for the public sector. Service offerings include network design, planning, deployment, operations, management, and technical support.

• Extensive partnerships—Cisco and its partners design, test, and install network solutions as a single, complete system, providing an advantage over systems composed of a combination of point products. Such collaboration with leading application and services providers helps governments build innovative, adaptable infrastructures for IP Communications, gaining the most value from their network investment.

• Industry-leading, standards-based solutions—Standards-based solutions reduce operational costs and facilitate integration with other systems. By making sure that its solutions interoperate with solutions from other vendors, Cisco helps customers protect and extend their investments.

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At the heart of Austria’s e-government initiative is a massive electronic file system shared by the federal administration and 12 Austrian ministries. Based on a Cisco foundation infrastructure and leading security solutions, the network expedites reliable access to data and enables cooperative electronic workflow among agencies. Efficiency has risen 10 to 15 percent. In addition, with 99.7 percent network availability, the agency is moving toward a paperless system.

Phase 5 in Action: Austrian Federal Data Center

The State of Schleswig-Holstein, which has 40,000 employees, previously maintained multiple voice and data networks for its various agencies. By sharing voice and data services among agencies, the state realized it could reduce costs, improve service, and improve bandwidth utilization to support new applications.

Today all Schleswig-Holstein agencies share a single voice-and-data service from an outsourced provider. Participants include the state administration, ministries, police, and others. The state enjoys 30 times more bandwidth as well as centralized management of security and communications. In addition, operational staff can now focus on core government services instead of network administration.

Phase 4 in Action: State of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany

Cisco Connected Government

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Argentina • Australia • Austria • Belgium • Brazil • Bulgaria • Canada • Chile • China PRC • Colombia • Costa Rica • Croatia • Cyprus • Czech Republic Denmark • Dubai, UAE • Finland • France • Germany • Greece • Hong Kong SAR • Hungary • India • Indonesia • Ireland • Israel • Italy Japan • Korea • Luxembourg • Malaysia • Mexico • The Netherlands • New Zealand • Norway • Peru • Philippines • Poland • Portugal Puerto Rico • Romania • Russia • Saudi Arabia • Scotland • Singapore • Slovakia • Slovenia • South Africa • Spain • Sweden Switzerland • Taiwan • Thailand • Turkey • Ukraine • United Kingdom • United States • Venezuela • Vietnam • Zimbabwe

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• Flexible financing options—Cisco offers a variety of affordable financing options to help governments build, maintain, and upgrade their technology solutions.

• Comprehensive network lifecycle services—Comprehensive network lifecycle support helps customers plan, design, implement, operate, assess, and optimize connected government network solutions. Administrations can use these services to gain maximum benefit from their network investments.

For more information about Cisco Connected Government or to schedule an assessment, call your Cisco representative or reseller. To find a local partner, visit

https://www.cisco.com/go/partnerlocator

1 Kable Research, August 2005.

2 Momentum Research Group, “Net Impact: Europe eGovernment: From Connectivity to Productivity,” 2004.