Change Management - Challenges and Opportunities Offered by e-Government - Case Study Example

Introduction Only a few technologies have received quick recognition and acceptance from a large number of people and the Internet is certainly one of these technologies. Today, the internet is being used by almost everyone to carry out ordinary or specific tasks. In this scenario, e-government is the way through which a government provides its services to its citizens, organizations, government administrations, public officers and agencies using the Internet. One of the most important opportunities that e-government brings its support in the form of non-stop services and extensive access to huge collection of information, regardless of time and location. On the other hand, there are various issues also associated with e-government such as illegal access to information and other security issues. In this scenario, change management is one of the most critical aspects of e-government, which can create various hurdles in the successful adoption of e-government[Min04]. This paper presents a detailed analysis of e-government and its relationship with change management. The structure of this paper is as follows: in the start this paper will present an overview of e-government, its advantages and disadvantages, after that a brief discussion will be provided on change management. In the last we will discuss the relationship between change management and e-government. Objective The basic purpose of this paper is to present the challenges and opportunities offered by e-government with a particular focus on change management. This paper will present a detailed discussion on key issues and challenges faced by e-government in order to identify the importance of change management in the success or failure of the e-government projects. In order to support these points some case studies will also be discussed. The implementation of e-government projects bring a variety of changes, which will be discussed in this paper as well. This paper will also discuss the strategies to make a change management process successful for the e-government projects. E-government E-government is not a new concept as it was previously emerged in 1990’s with the emergence of e-commerce. Up till now, a large number of definitions have been presented to explain the concept of e-government. In this scenario, e-government is a web based platform that encompasses nearly all applications and information and communication technology (ICT) platforms utilized by the public sector. In simple words, e-government refers to “use of the internet and web based tools technologies for providing government information and services to public and other institutions”[Tar12]. The research has shown that e-government can be used as a very useful tool and platform for increasing trust and confidence of their citizens in their governments. There are many benefits of e-government. Of course, all the benefits that come with the use of Internet can be considered as the benefits of e-government. According to [Hat13] e-government is believed to an added service platform, among a wide variety of service channels, which can be used by public in an attempt to communicate and interact with government entities and public administration. Some of the useful and attractive features of e-government can involve the ease, effectiveness and convenience of utilizing the internet. In this scenario, the development of e-government platforms allows its citizens to contact easily with their government entities and public administrations for a variety of reasons for example attempting to play a role in public policy, performing transactions with government, for taking help to address private concerns that people have, and determining and using information on services and benefits that government provides on their platform. Hence, e-government is believed to be an excellent option among a variety of options in communicating and providing services to its public. In this scenario, different governments adopt e-government platform for attaining different goals. For instance, some governments are intended to offer improved services to their public, some are intended to improve public participation and communication, and some want to manage their resources in a better way[Hat13]. Up till now, a large number of governments have taken e-government initiatives to achieve different goals however only a small percentage of the e-government systems in developing countries have been successful, on the other hand the majority of them are either completely or partially failures[Hat13]. The research has shown that the governments of developing countries such as Egypt has been facing serious challenges in adopting e-government. In fact, the majority of these implementations have proved to failures or they could not take benefit of these implementations. In other words, the implementations of e-government in developing countries are usually more challenging as compared to those in the developed nations. In this scenario, the research of [Tar12] explore a variety of challenges faced by developing countries in the context of their launched and implemented e-government initiatives. Though, they agree that the implementations of e-government present a number of benefits and opportunities for governments; on the other hand, the capabilities and skills of developing countries that are required to achieve these benefits and opportunities are still limited. In this scenario, some of the issues and challenges that hinder the successful implementations of e-governments are outlined below[Tar12]: One of the basic reasons that e-government initiatives fail to achieve their goal is the lack of awareness regarding government services in developing countries from both sides whether they are common public or public organizations’ employees. The existing rules and regulations and organizational structures do not support the requirements of e-government implementations. There is a lack of trust among government employees when carrying out tasks online. There are not much researches and studies carried out for determining the impact and usefulness of e-government initiatives especially developing countries such as Egypt. A variety of risks associated with consequences and results dues to change management in e-government. The lack of resources and training and education programs with respect to learning the use of computer especially the Internet. The execution of tasks on the Internet involves a variety of security and privacy related concerns for instance the lack of security of information. The research has shown that in these developing countries there is shortage of IT skills due to which a variety of change management issues also emerge. The majority of stakeholders think that e-government initiatives will cause a reduction in the role of intervention. The incorporation of English language in electronic content development is also a serious challenge. In the same way, the stakeholders fear that e-government initiatives will cause reduction in the role of their workers and people in completing tasks. The issues that have been discussed above are presented in the context of the implementations of e-government in developing countries and Egypt is one of them as well. In addition, the majority of these issues refer to a common issue and that is change management, which is believed to be a critical part of e-governments[Tar12]. Change Management: A critical aspect of e-government The implementation of e-government projects bring a variety of challenges to change management because in view of the fact that new implementations can require the co-evolution of the front office service and related back office IT environment. In view of the fact that e-government is aimed at changing the traditional government support process into a modernized and web based platforms so these changes can bring a variety of change management issues. In other words, the management of e-government is some kind of management of change as traditional environment is going to be changed into a modern platform. The research has shown that the majority of e-government projects have failed due to their poor change management strategies. In their paper, [Jan12] discuss the results of a survey which shows only the less than 15 percent of e-government projects in developing countries are able to get success, while more than 35 percent project completely fail and almost 50% of them partially fail. The identified that in the developing countries poor change management strategy has always been under estimated in e-government projects. In fact, governments have has no strategies how to take care of changes happened due to adoption of modern technology, for instance changes in policy, mindset, culture, organizational structure and process. Due to these underestimation a variety of other issues have also emerged as discussed above, which make the implementation of an e-government project a failure. In this scenario, change management is the process which systemizes the management of changes that are brought by the adoption of these technologies [Jan12]. Why should E-Government create changes? Whenever a new technology or tool is adopted or a new way of management is adopted the changes are always seen. In fact, the implementation of a new tool or technology is aimed at changing the existing practices and methodologies. For instance, the implementation of e-government projects is initiated to change the existing or traditional practices that have been used for carrying out Government tasks. In this scenario, the traditional tasks are being performing by means of latest technologies such as the Internet, which brings changes the behaviors of people, as they are not used to these technologies. There are various other changes that come along with the implementation of e-government such as organizational structures, communication channels, way of working and many more [Jan12]. What changes e-government brings? Actually, e-government is not the process of buying new computers and replacing them with traditional processes. However, it contains a variety of aspects and in order to attain the complete benefits of e-government, the governments must consider all the associated aspects as well. Basically, e-government brings a variety of changes which can be categorized in different categories. Some of them are outlined below[Sam09]: Legacy Systems: Without a doubt, the major change is shifting from traditional and legacy systems to a modern and computerized system. There are many aspects associated with this change as well. For instance, in some case employees will not accept the implementation of new systems as they are used to work on traditional systems. Disjointed Systems and Departments: As e-government projects combine various departments of a government into a single platform. However, in some cases this change can cause serious challenges as some departments do not want to lose their identification and want to work separately. Changes in Employees attitude: With the implementation of modern technologies the attitude of employees will change as they will start feeling that their job will be lost due to this change. So they become against this change. Changes in Responsibilities: Previously employees and stakeholders have been carrying out their tasks traditionally so they have good idea what they have to do. On the other hand, the implementation of new technology changes their responsibilities and tasks they need to carry out which can bring various changes to their working structure, Changes in authority: New system leads to further slide as well as lack of choice by individual workers who work on these systems. Hence, these workers fear a loss of authority and go against change. Resistance to Outsiders: As the implementation of e-government requires extensive knowledge and skills of IT so employees have to get training to learn this technology. In this scenario, another source of resistance emerge that make employees against this technology. IT Professionals Take the Lead: The major part of responsibilities is played by the IT professionals so they become the source of attraction by the organizations. Case Studies In their paper [Hat13] discuss various case studies of e-government projects that became a failure. For this purpose they selected the cases of Matrouh and Al-Tor. They have carried out a detailed analysis to determine the reasons behind the failure of these e-government projects. The results of their analysis showed that the implementation of systems was fine and the systems those were implemented were working effectively. However, the major reasons behind the failures of their failure to address change management properly. These cases pointed out various issues regarding cooperation among staff members with respect to system implementations. The study clearly showed that the management did not consider the viewpoints of their employees and they implemented these systems to computerize the overall process. On the other hand, these implementations brought serious challenges and employees did not cooperate with use of these technologies and finally the management had to remove these systems. Hence, these implementations turn out to be failure. Though, the technology worked fine in order to support tasks for which they were implemented but the implementation of proper change management process lacked in the projects which led the projects towards failure. The cases show how only one or two factors can affect the overall project[Hat13]. Change Management Strategies for a successful e-government program The research has shown that the majority of e-government projects fail due to overlooking their change management strategies. In fact, they thought about applying change management after the project has been initiated, designed and implementation has begun. In the majority of projects, change management is initiated when the implementation is started. So it is not useful to apply change management at this end. The change management should begin with the beginning of a project. In this scenario, change management should be started at high level during the project feasibility and conceptualization study. It is very important for the project management body to include change management process and associated activities as an integral part of their project plan. In order to increase the chances of an e-government project, change management related activities should be developed by an internal team having the required level of competency, and recommended to be supported by an external advisor team. In fact, the internal team will have enough knowledge of risks and benefits that they need to address for the specific implementation and what kind of activities their employees will like. All the stakeholders should be engaged in the change management process and their feedback should be taken at every stage whenever a change is implemented. The employees are the major stakeholders who have to use this technology for the benefit of a government so they should be encouraged and motivated and the government should make them believe that they are not going to be replaced with the technology. A detailed cost and benefit analysis should be carried out to determine the risks and benefits associated with the implementation of a change. A detailed research should be carried out to see the effective nesses and risks associated with these projects and particularly take into considerations failed projects. Common public should also be involved and a survey should be conducted to see their feedback on a new service or change[Dep06]. Conclusion This paper has presented a detailed analysis of the implementation of e-government projects with respect to a particular focus on change management. The research has shown that e-government projects can sure play a significant role in the modernization of a government structure as they bring a large number of benefits supported through the modernism of technology. However, there are many issues associated with the implementation of these modernism. In this scenario, change management always remains a critical factor of every e-government project for the reason that e-government brings a large number of changes at each level and for every stakeholder involved in a project. This paper has shown that if change management is not considered effectively then a successful and useful technology can become a failure because it is supporting the changes not the people who might be against changes. This paper has discussed the results with the help of various case studies. Before implementation of these projects all the associated stakeholders should be involved and careful change management process should be implemented. In addition, all the associated stakeholders should be encouraged in taking part in government decisions and the suggestions provided by these stakeholders should be seriously considered in order to avoid any misunderstanding. Bibliography Min04: , (Hwang, et al., 2004; Nograsek, 2012), Tar12: , (Gebba & Zakaria, 2012), Hat13: , (Elkadi, 2013), Hat13: , (Elkadi, 2013), Tar12: , (Gebba & Zakaria, 2012), Jan12: , (Nograsek, 2012), Sam09: , (Sacheva, 2009), Dep06: , (Department of Administrative Reforms & Public Grievances, 2006), Read More