The majority of the challenges that government CIOs face while trying to implement digital transformation are non-technical in nature. Research by Gartner shows that most governments have not yet scaled digital solutions across their organizations. Gartner has identified some of the biggest obstacles that government CIOs face and advises steps to tackle them head-on. CIOs must take direct action to tackle these challenges as it is critical for digital transformation in government.
“If these challenges are left unaddressed, digital government programs run the risk of losing sustained funding and, of course, the ability for organizations to leverage the promised benefits of digital solutions,” says Dean Lacheca, Gartner Senior Director Analyst.
Tackling the top 5 digital transformation challenges
1. Organizational silos According to the research, 51% of respondents find siloed strategies and decision-making as a priority challenge. Organizational silos have been a constant concern impacting a successful digital transformation.
Action plan:
Set roles and dependencies – define ownership of the digital strategy’s development and assign accountability for its success.
Form decision-making principles – to prioritize, fund, and deliver cross-siloed digital initiatives.
2. Risk-averse culture
In an environment where the workforce is reluctant to change and take risks, a CIO driving digital transformation will face an acute challenge. For this, CIOs must align their digital programs with business outcomes and focus on making organizational change the core element of such programs.
Action plan:
- Coordinate with business leaders across the organization to assess the cultural barriers and find catalysts for digital transformation.
- Organize a digital leadership professional development program across the government as well as within the IT organization.
3. Insufficient funding
Insufficient funding can be the result of siloed strategies and decision-making or due to the perception of technology expenditure as an operational investment instead of a strategic investment.
Action plan:
- Be agile and flexible to identify and utilize intermittent funding opportunities and align or reprioritize the digital investments with the business-outcome-driven criteria of available funding.
- Envision a digitally transformed future reflecting local political priorities, backed by an implementation plan that delivers timely results to business leaders.
4. Digital skills’ gap
The lack of digital skills across the organizations is another common digital transformation challenge for government CIOs. Successful digital transformation programs demand core specialist competencies in enterprise architecture, cybersecurity, cloud, analytics, and digital experience design.
Action plan:
- Offer employees experiences outside their functional silos so that it helps them understand the multifaceted nature of digital business and enables them to build expertise in business areas critical to the organization’s digital business plans.
- Instead of position-based paths, create experience-based career paths to enable employees with multiple career path options and cross-functional experiences.
5. Lack of IT-business resources
As per the research, 28% of respondents saw IT talent shortage as a major challenge, hindering the adoption among major technology domains. Disconnected priorities, siloed decision-making, and cultural challenges are the blockers to timely accessing IT, business, and subject matter experts.
Training employees to use self-service digital/low-code technologies is useful, but more needs to be done to prepare them for complex digital business environments.
Building the digital capability of IT resources and filling the digital skills’ gaps across the organization can have a positive impact on resourcing. As the digital investments across all industries have increased post-pandemic, CIOs will need to make a coordinated effort to ensure adequate resources are deployed to the right initiatives in a timely way.
Action plan:
- Demand for an executive-sponsored digital capability program that invests in communication and education at all levels of the organization for enabling digital proficiency and ensuring the right capabilities and culture to support the digital program.
Image and source credit: Gartner
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