Consumerization Of Government Services Starts With Case Management

Federal CIOs must meet the rising expectations of citizens while operating under continual budget reductions and with aging systems. By adopting a case-centric approach to customer service, CIOs can help their agencies become more efficient and provide citizens with the same connected customer experience they have come to expect from online services in other industries.

When citizens interact with the government, they expect to have the same experience they receive in their everyday personal lives, whether it is buying books on Amazon, downloading music on iTunes, or using Bank of America's online banking. These companies offer a user experience tailored to their customers' needs and personalities, enabling customers to access services quickly and easily anytime, anywhere and through any device -- an experience not often replicated by government agencies.

Often times in government, the process of gathering and processing the information to serve a citizen can be more complicated, and is often slow and disjointed, which may negatively affect the quality and efficiency of service delivery. A case-centric approach can help resolve this issue by tying together people, content and analysis to complete work, all under one umbrella.

With a case-centric approach, agencies can track information more efficiently, make automated intelligent decisions, and route casework accordingly. This can mean serving a specific customer and fulfilling a request, or working across agencies to achieve a shared result, such as solving a crime, reducing the time required to determine whether a citizen is eligible for certain benefits, or even responding to a natural disaster and supporting recovery.

The move to digital is critical if agencies wish to improve their standard of service -- and it means taking a holistic perspective at how your agency interacts with customers and considering new ways to leverage technology.

To enable an efficient, digital government, traditional approaches and technologies need to be revamped. The successful transition to a case-centric approach considers the following best practices:

Understand the case management problem in its broader context, rather than trying to resolve the problem through a technology solution. Modern case management solutions touch upon various aspects of workflow, customer interaction, content management, business rules and mobility. Your agency must first understand its processes and requirements for each of these capabilities before looking to automate them in any technology solution.

Focus on achieving a single, consolidated view of the citizen or the case to enhance engagement and drive personalized experiences. By having this consolidated view, case workers will spend less time trying to piece together what the view of the citizen or case should be, and more time in addressing citizens' needs and resolving the case.

Embrace the shift to multichannel solutions and adopt operating models that support the new norm of a mobile and remote workforce. By allocating underutilized knowledgeable workers and employing automated business processes, agencies can build a more efficient workforce and improve their case management and mobility abilities.

Government agencies can no longer perceive citizens merely as citizens, and must realize that citizens perceive themselves as customers and the government as a service provider. A case-centric approach will help enable government agencies offer the citizens they serve the efficient and seamless service they seek -- and expect -- by developing and implementing a holistic mechanism that supports well-organized information tracking, automated decision making and smooth workflow processing.

Apply now for the 2015 InformationWeek Elite 100, which recognizes the most innovative users of technology to advance a company's business goals. Winners will be recognized at the InformationWeek Conference, April 27-28, 2015, at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas. Application period ends Jan. 16, 2015.