Digital Transformation Capabilities

The Digital Transformation Capabilities project aims to develop mindset, methods and associated capabilities to support the creation of good public services – a common language for transforming services.

Other digital leadership projects set out the vision for transformation however this needs to be underpinned by clear methods, design literacy standards and the capability and capacity to drive real transformation.

Many best practice capabilities for digital transformation have been evidenced in the private sector and public sector e.g. the Government Digital Service, that put the focus for digital transformation on the user experience and service design.

Councils have been using a range of change management practices which have been largely process led. However this project is about transforming not changing services therefore the approaches being used are mostly service or outcome led using methods such as Service Design, Open Innovation and Agile. The service led approaches focuses on citizens and are well suited to re-designing services from an outside-in perspective where a lot of engagement is required with citizens (this is true “transformation”). The outcome led approaches tend to focus on solving big civic challenges where no obvious solutions exist and a more speculative approach is needed.