Getting to the starting line for Digital Transformation
Many organisations continue to grapple with digital transformation and wonder what it can actually deliver amid a risk of failure. In this four-part blog series, we take a look at a real-world case study of the steps Accelera took with the NSW Health Care Complaints Commission to assist the organisation on its digital transformation journey.
The NSW Health Care Complaints Commission (HCCC) acts to protect public health and safety by dealing with complaints about health service providers across the state. The commission’s drivers for transformation include allowing complainants and providers to engage through digital channels, to reduce the use of paper across the agency, and to streamline and digitize processes. The vision is for the people of NSW to benefit from faster and better outcomes.
The commission’s drivers for transformation include allowing complainants and providers to engage through digital channels, to reduce the use of paper across the agency, and to streamline and digitize processes. The vision is for the people of NSW to benefit from faster and better outcomes.
“Accelera takes a holistic view of digital and was able to help transform our organisation while we maintained existing levels of service delivery. We are now on a clear journey of digitally-driven innovation.” Eddie Van Den Bempt, Director, Corporate Operations & CFO, NSW Healthcare Complaints Commission
In this first part, we take a look at the importance of assessing an organisation’s readiness for digital transformation.
Assessing digital transformation readiness
An important first step in any digital transformation program is an assessment of how ready the organisation is to start the journey. The ICT function’s resilience, change management, security and above all delivery capability to the rest of organisation needs to be running smoothly before transformation can begin.
Transforming an organisation and leveraging digital platforms requires that the ICT function is robust and ready to support that transformation. It’s often the case that the ICT function is barely able to keep up with internal Business As Usual (BAU) demands, let alone deliver far-reaching projects to transform. When an already-stretched ICT function tries to deliver transformation projects, they often fail, and ICT service to the organisation suffers as well.
The HCCC engaged Accelera as part of a consortium to review the its ICT operating model and determine readiness for starting on the digital transformation journey.
Prior to the review, the commission struggled to get traction on its transformation initiatives, due to a number of challenges:
- A high reliance on legacy infrastructure platforms
- Rapid upskilling needed for security compliance, including for ISO27001 and ACSC Essential 8
- Internal ICT teams already stretched with high business-as-usual workloads
- Core software platforms in danger of running out of support & compliance
- Customised internal software requiring increasing enhancements and change management
It’s not unusual to see these difficulties in an organisation whose ICT capability was scaled for relatively stable BAU operations. But times change, demands rise, needs change dynamically and the ICT function becomes a critical enabler for changing the way an organisation works. If the ICT capability is not ready, it can cause friction and delays. The assessment’s core finding was that the ICT function itself needed transformation to be able to support the wider transformation agenda.
To achieve this transformation, it was recommended that the HCCC develop and drive initiatives to modernise its ICT operations, as follows:
- Security: Improve the security posture of the organisation’s platform, ensuring ongoing compliance
- Reliability: Ensure the core infrastructure and software platforms were at the latest, most secure and reliable versions from vendors
- Manageability: Free up the internal ICT resources to be able to deliver new initiatives, by partnering with external vendors to provide contestable, generic ICT services
- Team: Re-shape the ICT team by bringing in a transformation leader, with an executive mandate to drive change
In our next post, we will cover the initiatives put in place to achieve the outcomes above. By transforming the ICT function around people, processes, platforms and priorities, the transformation of the organisation becomes possible.
To see & download the full case study, visit our case study page.
