Since the early 2000s, governments and public sector organizations have allowed departments to spearhead their own digital transformation initiatives.
IT teams migrate services online or attempt to integrate their existing services in various ways, relaying on a patchwork of external vendors or using up valuable internal resources.
In many cases, migration plans can span several years and require a tremendous amount of resources for testing and deployment, incurring frequent overruns in budget costs and timelines.
With many lessons to learn in the course of better shaping our digital ambitions, citizens are often left wondering why government eservice delivery lags so far behind other industries. So, how can modern City Hall quickly construct an effective digital portal that truly serves the needs of its citizens? Here are some frequent challenges in governmental digitalization efforts and tips on how to solve them.
Consolidating Digital Public Services: Some Common Concerns
IT teams across North Americas municipalities and government organizations often inherit a complex digital puzzle and must contend with many seemingly conflicting concerns:
- How to balance optimal performance and user experience with the protection of personal information in the fight against ever-increasing cyberattacks?
- How to reduce silos and function independently while providing a unified user experience?
- How to enhance the performance of existing public digital services without completely replacing aging systems?
- And above all, how to balance resources restraints while maintaining the highest in compliance standards they must meet.
Using Multiple CMS and Plugins
While there's a significant temptation to use different content management systems for each department (libraries, urban planning, municipal taxes), maintaining this approach long-term can be problematic.
The CMS and its extensions can be challenging to keep updated. Often, different functionalities will lead to entirely different interfaces and an inconsistent experience from one website to another.
Maintaining a consistent brand image is crucial in online services delivery. A lack of cohesion or friction in finding information can easily harm public engagement, resulting in reduced trust in the municipality or the current government.
Using Multiple IAM, CIAM, or CRM Systems to Access Different Portals
There are many high-performing IAM, CIAM, and CRM tools available today. Their terms of use must be carefully reviewed, as some platforms host their servers in various parts of the world, and may reserve the right to monitor user data. These factors could lead to issues of non-compliance with data residency and privacy laws.
Moreover, the proliferation of different interfaces, credentials, and passwords for each platform shifts the headache from internal teams to the citizens, negatively impacting the user experience.
Maintaining Physical Processes to Verify User Identity
For security reasons or out of habit, many administrations maintain hybrid processes (email, phone, in-person) for service registration or to verify the identity of users.
For many citizens who work daily on digital channels, the needless complexity of these processes can be frustrating and discouraging, leading to high abandonment rates and delays in their requests. Such complications can significantly increase citizen dissatisfaction and fuel cynicism toward public service bureaucracy.
CitizenOne: A Comprehensive Solution to Accelerate Digital Transformation
In most public institutions and municipalities, the multitude of portals and aging systems hinder the complete migration of services to the digital channel. Databases rich with thousands of pieces of sensitive information also present further challenges for security teams. Developed in partnership with early adopters at the provincial government level, CitizenOne is a trusted citizen portal that can assist teams in migrating and consolidating access to services across departments in a secure and compliant manner.
Fully Searchable and Easy-to-Consult Catalog
Citizens understandably want quick and efficient access to services provided by their governments and municipalities. Integrating CitizenOne’s Services Catalog Accelerator helps unify the entire user experience for easier and more seamless interactions in the digital channel.
The CitizenOne’s Services Catalog Accelerator enables users to find exactly what they're looking for in just a few clicks on a clear, coherent page with an efficient search engine. No more navigating from one site to another or getting lost in a multitude of tabs.
Using pre-configured APIs and your organization’s URL links, web pages can be grouped together and organized into a single catalog based on set criteria.
Designed to be self-service, configurable, and accessible to all audiences, these catalogs provide a consistent user experience optimized across all device types.
Register for Services Through a Single Dashboard
Simplicity and fluidity are the keywords for user experience.
After identifying the service they're interested in, citizens can securely log into a dashboard that can be personalized based on the user’s level of interaction.
If additional identification information is required for certain services, the interface allows for intuitive and quick entry.
CitizenOne allows organization to connect existing portals or design new service workflows, all while maintaining a consistent interface that is certified as accessible, with a coherent experience from start to finish.
A Single Secure Login for Better Adoption Rates
The unification of online services also involves simplifying onboarding processes.
CitizenOne offers a secure login session and an advanced IAM tool with integration support for other 3rd party tools. It also introduces a granular approach to identity verification.
Once logged into the consolidated dashboard, the user may need to provide other personal information depending on the security requirements of the chosen service.
For instance, access to an individual's tax account can require them to provide an account number along with a second authentication factor, like an SMS.
By initiating this unique and secure session, the user experiences less friction and the overall process simplified.
In fact, among current CitizenOne clients, this method has led to an impressive adoption rate of 77% amongst the constituent population.
Strengthening Trust with Modern and Adaptive Identity Verification
As digital public services increase in number, it's becoming vital to adopt a more adaptive approach to consent and access rules. For instance, booking a swimming session doesn't require the same criteria as accessing a marriage certificate.
By basing information and credential collection on context and consent, citizens' trust while safeguarding the administration from excessive personal data collection.
Empowering Citizens Over Control of Their Personal Information
Municipalities and public organizations now have the opportunity to accelerate digital eservice delivery and set new standards, surpassing the private sector.
With the trusted citizen portal CitizenOne users benefit from a transparent platform enabling them to manage or revoke their consents, and view what data is shared across different departments.
This approach, increasingly sought after by legislative frameworks, is tangible proof of the importance placed on information security and citizens autonomy, demonstrating that it is possible to offer a superior user experience while giving citizens control over their data.
Steamlining Access Rules and Identity Verification
Architected to the principles of Privacy by Design, CitizenOne ensures better digital hygiene by allowing progressive disclosure of personal information in accordance to the service being accessed.
CitizenOne's Enhanced Trust package establishes the necessary steps during onboarding, using two-factor authentication or further data validation to proof the identity of the user. Moreover, CitizenOne enables the secure connection of verification processes to authoritative data sources, making it easier to validate account numbers, permits, or other identification information.
Simplifying Policies and Consent
With departments often operating in silos, tracking and updating policies is a cumbersome operation. By centralizing all policies within CitizenOne, the process becomes less disparate. All policies are available in one place, with the ability to manage and track changes in real time. This not only reduces time spent selecting and updating policies but also facilitates inter-departmental translation.
IT teams can easily select and apply appropriate policies without the need to constantly consult legal departments, speeding up deployment time and ensuring the correct verification mechanisms are associated with the appropriate policies. The result guarantees ongoing compliance and strengthe citizen trust in the citizen portal.
A Solid Foundation for Identity Management
In the evolving landscape of digital public services, flexibility is crucial. Municipalities need solutions that can evolve with them, whether the goal is to expand the use of existing identity stores or establish a foundation for a secure identity portal. There's no need to replace everything. In many cases, governments prefer to retain their existing tools and evaluate possible solutions in the medium term.
Citizen One’s native Identity Management & Authentication module can be deployed, integrating smoothly with existing IAM (Identity and Access Management) or CIAM (Customer Identity and Access Management) tools. This means you can continue using the systems you have in place while benefiting from CitizenOne's added features, guarenteeing ease of transition and a high adoptive rate.
Simplified Management of Multiple Personas for an Efficient Citizen Portal
In the modern world of digital public services, every individual takes on multiple roles, whether as a parent, entrepreneur, caregiver, or lawyer. The many facets of their identity translate into a maze of administrative processes that IT teams must orchestrate. CitizenOne, through its advanced platform, recognizes the importance of a multi-faceted identity.
The trusted portal offers an effective solution for managing different "personas," allowing citizens to act according to their multiple roles.
An entrepreneur, for example, can delegate administrative responsibilities to a colleague, just as a caregiver might act on behalf of a person in their care.
Optimized Form Management for Smooth Services
Forms are ubiquitous in public services. Yet, their administration is often a major source of complexity. Grant portals are a glaring example. Drafting a form often requires the involvement of multiple people, making the process tedious.
With CitizenOne's integrated forms management module, administrators can delegate various sections of a form to different individuals, facilitating collaboration.
Furthermore, citizens benefit from a uniform interface. Information can be automatically filled in, reducing the need for duplicate entries and greatly speeding up the process while maintaining data security.
For internal teams, this centralization allows for better management and reduces the risk of error in data capture.
Boosting the Growth of Arts, Communities, and Economic Development
The impact of CitizenOne goes well beyond administrative simplification. Non-profit organizations and small businesses often face significant administrative challenges. Having to navigate mazes of bureaucracy and operating with limited resources. An optimal form management platform can save time and streamline processes for non-profits, allowing them to better track their requests, communicate effectively with governmental entities, and obtain the necessary support for growth.
CitizenOne: Innovation in Service of Trust
In an era where digital migration has become a necessity, trust in solutions not only lies in their operation but in their ability to innovate without causing disruption.
At Portage CyberTech, the notion of innovation is at the heart of our development teams and practices. Here's how we assist our clients in consistently embracing innovation in a scalable and compliant manner.
Self-service Configuration: Deployment with Risk Control
Setting up a citizen portal should neither be a laborious nor a risky process. With CitizenOne, the burden of complex integration is gone.
Thanks to a self-service configuration, institutions can start integrating their services almost immediately, merging their existing tools into a platform with a full solutions suite of capabilities.
This agile approach breaks down traditional barriers, enabling smooth and efficient deployment, all based on similar and extensively tested deployments with public sector customers.
Management of Digital Proof: Towards Greater Control of Personal Identity
The rise of digital credentials is dramatically transforming how governmental entities interact with citizens.
These decentralized and secure identities offer an unprecedented level of control, blurring the lines between physical and digital interactions.
With CitizenOne’s identity engine, a municipality can issue a verifiable and portable identity to an individual. This innovation, akin to a concert ticket QR code or boarding pass, allows citizens to store their identity on their smartphone, securely housed in a digital wallet.
With this technology, it becomes possible to easily validate an individual's attribute, such as age or vaccination status, without divulging their birthdate, gender, or home address. This approach ensures citizens reveal less data while still gaining access to essential services.
Compliance with the New Regulatory Framework
In the ever-changing landscape of regulations, it is crucial for any citizen portal to comply with current standards.
CitizenOne not only meets these requirements but anticipates them, ensuring administrations remain up-to-date and aligned with the evolving needs of society.
Internal teams stay informed about regulatory frameworks in Europe, Canada, and the United States, allowing them to respond to industry trends even before certain regulatory directions are adopted.
As many organizations operate across multiple continents, this ensures a future proofed, global solution, evolving with legislative change.
Putting the Citizen at the Heart of Action
CitizenOne positions itself as a flexible and agile tool, designed to promptly meet the changing requirements of citizens, communities, and technologies.
Thanks to its unparalleled flexibility, it allows governmental entities to move with unprecedented speed and efficiency to ensure that the concerns of citizens are addressed with the urgency they deserve.
By embodying a vision of transparency and encouraging strong ties between administrations and citizens, the platform helps open and honest collaboration. Clear and direct access to services ensure that processes are transparent and understandable, establishing a mutual trust and strengthening civic engagement.
About CitizenOne
CitizenOne is a citizen portal built by the public sector for the public sector. First deployed in 2016, it has been continuously developed, tested, and enhanced by provinces and territories across Canada, with millions of users today.
The solution provides an easy and intuitive way for citizens to renew their health insurance card, driver's license, apply for permits and access their records. Fully mobile and responsive, it can be used on any device.
For more information or to request a demo, from our team of experts.