The Nigerian Government disclosed that it is working to digitize public service before the end of the first quarter of 2023.
This was disclosed by Mrs Ibiene Roberts, Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Special Duties and Intergovernmental Affairs, on Monday during the formal presentation of the Standard Operation Procedures (SOP) to the Minister, Sen. George Akume, on Monday in Abuja.
She added that the procedure was in line with the directives of the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation (HOCSF) to Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDA).
What they are saying
Mrs Roberts disclosed that the Federal Government is working to digitise public service before the end of the first quarter of 2023, adding that all MDAs were to formally document and present the SOPs developed in their respective MDAs in hardcopies for ease of reference.
She said the procedure was in line with the directives of the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation (HOCSF) to Ministries Departments and Agencies (MDA).
She said: “For institutional memory, SOP is a step-by-step instruction that acts as guideline for an employee’s work processes and best describes the activities necessary to complete tasks in a particular schedule.
“It is an aspect of the Enterprise Content Management (ECM) with the mandate to digitise records and automate workflow to achieve overall improvement in information sharing and collaboration across the MDAs.
“When employees follow the SOP for a particular job, they produce a product that is consistent and predictable,’’ she said, citing that ministry was given the responsibility to cascade the development of SOPs in the agencies under its direct supervision for full operation of the ECM in the civil service.
“To do this, the Departmental Champions will be adequately trained to help cascade the SOPs to our agencies,’’ she said.
The Minister, Sen. George Akume, while receiving the documents said the transformative initiatives of this present administration are crucial to ameliorate the challenges faced by the civil servants in the discharge of their duties. He added the resultant effects of the document would promote efficiency and effectiveness in job performance and delivery.
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FG to fully digitise civil service operations by Q1 2023
This is coming rather later late but commendable, well done. I will however like to recommend as follows:
1. That clearly defined top-level objectives with expected output is communicated to parties involved. In other words, what do we want achieved from this digitization roadmap across MDAs and how does it help manage the effectiveness of our operations? – This should be done with the consciousness and in alignment with the “vision of building a digitized economy”.
2. That a well thought through BIA process is initiated to predict and provide visibility into the change impacts across all MDA and private sector operations (global impacts inclusive) whilst scanning for mitigating recommendations in containing and managing identified impacts not limited to people, processes and technology.
3. Provide documented and mapped “AS-IS customer journeys and processes” alongside the SOPs as a complementary effort to 1 above for inclusive review in the BIA process and corresponding stakeholder engagements with a view of coming up with the “To-Be” Processes & journeys alongside recommended technology (One platform) – we do not want to deploy technologies or commence digitization roadmap based on obsolete people and mindsets, behaviours, structures and roles, journeys and processes.
4. Provide the cost benefit analysis as an inclusive part of the BIA output to justify and motivate for the programme and its corresponding performance outputs.