Digital Government Excellence. Siim Sikkut

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ me. I am also trying to understand where we could use the new person in the future. What are his or her intentions: to remain an expert or also become a manager? Things like this.

      I also started using personal tests in recruiting. The interview times are so short that it is difficult to be sure of the person fitting the task. The tests supported the final decision-making.

Who Was Your Most Impactful Hire?

      The three heads of unit, or team heads who were my direct reports and managed people in the team directly. A big part of my initial department reorganization was opening the management team positions. I got in people that were willing to cooperate, with whom we were able to create a trust relationship, with whom we were on the same page so that we could also easily substitute for each other. Each person was also of a different type. This made us work well as a team because there was always good, necessary discussion about the best way forward.

What Do You Consider Your Biggest Achievement in the GCIO Role?

      I had been asked to deliver, and we delivered: the X-Road implementation, suomi.fi services, information management law, and so on.

We also created a Digitalization Agency to drive true digitalization in the government and its services.⁵ Its trial some years earlier had not succeeded. With people and mindsets changing, we managed to get the idea adopted. The agency is meant to aid and boost digitalization efforts of ministries.

      I am happy that I was also able to create good and trustworthy relationships. This includes with all my four ministers. We built up personal good relations with them even though they were from different parties. I have always told my opinion, and always looked out for Finland as a whole, and that was the premise of our collaboration.

      I also built up a wide network in the whole state, including municipalities and especially ministries, but also on international level. Our customers are our agencies, we need to deliver for them and keep in touch. But the network meant I was able to always connect and ask for advice or help. If you have good contacts, you always find where to ask for help or support. Networking takes work. That is why I started to work on it in the beginning already.

Are There Things You Would Have Done Differently or Things You Even Failed At?

      I did not manage so well to get some politicians to understand what digitalization means and why we needed to invest in it. I wanted them to look into the future more, when factories are not the only working places, and what sort of opportunities this creates for doing work in Finland. Getting them to understand that world is changing around us.

      We were told that public sector ICT was very expensive and spending too much money. We even had some ministers who did not understand that everything in the government needed ICT to work, or staff such as police officers would have to go back to using paper and pencil. This meant that money had to be put into ICT for it to work.

      I think I did not find the right channels for this message. Looking back, we could have perhaps early on done more benchmarking or showcasing on how much money other countries were committing to digital government. Looking at it now, I do not blame the politicians but myself—that I was not able to provide the right material or background for them to understand what needed to be the way forward.

      The thing is that I am not the person who wants to be in the public spotlight. All my predecessors had been in IT news and other professional media continuously. I told to my bosses already in our first call that this was my handicap. Perhaps a publicly more-visible leading role would have also helped to make my case with politicians, too.

What Made You Leave Office in 2021?

      Well, I had been in the position seven years in total by that time. The last of my terms was ending and I had to decide if I would apply again for next years. I felt that I had given what I could, for Finland and for these tasks. It was time for a new person to come in with bright ideas, also time for the department and the network to get in someone new with fresh ideas and ways of doing. I believe in change.

How Did You Work to Make Your Changes Last or Stick?

      During my last year, we worked on a new strategy and an action plan with the whole department, looking out to year 2025. I thought this would make it easier for the next government CIO to take over, because the strategy and work plan would be laid out. He or she should make adjustments, of course. But as the team was involved in working it out, then the whole organization would be already behind it and ready to take this way forward. The department team actually had demanded or suggested to make the strategy.

      Some of our ongoing initiatives also are supported and prioritized by the minister, especially those based on the government program. This adds to the platform that my successor can take up. But the platform of plans is still open enough so that its own changes can be made. I also went through the strategy with my successor when he came in, and I hope he finds it a bridge forward and worth building on.

      When I actually left, I told my department that I admired their work and believed that they would support my successor by taking our achievements forward to the next level. I hope that this helps everything to go forward, too.

What Is the State of Finnish Digital Government Today? What Are the Remaining Challenges?

      When I started, I went abroad to see how other countries had digitalized and learn about what to do. The same countries I went to visit have been now coming to visit us in return. It shows that we have achieved something by digitalizing Finland if others are coming to see our results.

      The remaining challenges are to develop and implement a mobile identity, which is a big change in the short term because it is not just improving the current electronic identity and how it operates. We were looking at a whole new way for identity. Also, the Digitalization Agency is now a couple of years old and still needs work to stabilize its services for delivery and customer satisfaction as well.

      COVID-19 has supported people seeing and understanding the big value in consolidated common services. Otherwise, government staff would not have been able to move to work at home in such a way so that everything continued working. This would not have been possible earlier when every agency had its own services. Now it is better understood that shared services can really give you a benefit.

What Do You Wish You Had Known When You Started in the Job, If You Look Back Now?

      I guess it would have helped me if I would have understood better the expectations on substance. I remember that when I joined the ministry and the department, people were already talking about digitalization more than ICT—but the department still had (and has) ICT in its title. So, for half a year I had to learn to understand that my work is not actually ICT, but digitalization! The thing is that nobody really explained what they expected from me.

What Are the Key Skills Necessary to Do the Government CIO Job Well?

As the CIO, you need to understand digitalization and the possibilities on a general level of what you can do. On the state level, you need to know how the government operates, the decision-making, the financial processes. Or you need to learn it. The faster you learn it, the better.

      My СКАЧАТЬ