e-GOVERNMENT IN FINLAND - ePractice.eu

partnerships”). The most significant structural change noted was in terms of the general organisational
rules of the agency or ministry, which may reflect a general increase in information sharing owing to the
use of e-mail and other communications technologies, albeit within the same traditional hierarchical
structures.
Figure 4.12. The impact of e-government activities on organisation structure
impact on reduction in
personnel, etc.
impact on outsourcing of
information tasks
impact on general
organisational rule
impact on public/private
service delivery partnership
Source: OECD
impact on hierarchy
Implementing organisational change
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
significant some little/no impact
271. In an administration that has seen many waves of reform in a relatively short period of time, the
launching of e-government initiatives has served to revitalise interest in improving government processes.
More than 70% of respondents to the OECD survey reported that e-government had increased incentives
and/or motivation in the workplace.
272. In many of the agencies interviewed, IT officials were conscious of the need for reform and
enthusiastic about the opportunities that e-government created to discuss how to go about it. For example,
in OECD interviews, the TUKES Safety Technology Agency reported a strong need to change internal
business processes and organisation culture. Its employees are, on average, 45 years old, and TUKES
emphasised that they do not want to think about how to work in new ways. It also reported that reengineering
is difficult: “it’s hard work to rethink processes”. Within working groups in the agency, there
has been considerable discussion of working styles.
273. Given the difficulty and time needed to rethink organisational processes, agencies off to the best
start are those that have invested both time and money in the re-engineering process (see Box 4.5). Not all
re-engineering efforts, however, have to be complete makeovers. E-government also offers opportunities to
rethink specific aspects of the service delivery chain, such as customer categories (see Box 4.6).
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