Accenture's fifth annual global e-government study

government is now undertaking a series of “catalytic”
projects that will likely provide the most value and
help move the transformation agenda forward.
Canada also regularly scrutinizes its overall progress
with a comprehensive set of performance management
tools. This approach has allowed Canada to
enhance its existing online offerings and build truly
innovative new services that customers want or need.
For example, the country’s portal, www.canada.gc.ca,
saw a number of enhancements to the main site
and to each of the client-centered gateways. The
Canada site’s main page was redesigned, incorporating
changes such as making the language more accessible
to users of all literacy levels, presenting a more
consistent organizational structure and providing
more efficient site navigation. All of these modifications
were validated by focus group testing.
One of the more interesting eGovernment developments
was in the country’s wireless portal
(http://canada.gc.ca/mobile/wireless_e.html). This
evolving pilot project is designed to provide users
with quick and easy access to contact information,
e-mail and in-person service points from their mobile
Internet-enabled device. The wireless portal complements
the existing service channels; information
accessible through the wireless portal is already
available on the Canada site, through 1 800 O-Canada
or at Service Canada Access Centres. Aside from
providing contact information, the wireless portal
provides access to information on border wait times,
government news and economic indicators. While
the wireless portal is still in its early stages, its growth
has been phenomenal: it experienced 900 percent
more activity in 2003 than in 2002, partly due to
the addition of four new services. New services and
information are planned for rollout over the course
of the next few months. As with all of Canada’s
Government On-line initiatives, criteria for including
services on the wireless portal have been developed
based on public opinion research, usability testing
and research of industry standards.
The Canadian government has made concerted
efforts in marketing to increase eGovernment service
take-up, and it seems to realize value in doing so. To
promote www.canada.gc.ca, the government used a
number of traditional marketing techniques in 2003.
Take-up of online services is increasing steadily.
Results from one of Canada’s own surveys showed
that more than 70 percent of Canadian Internet
users had visited a Government of Canada website
at least once in 2002—up from 61 percent in 2000. 5
Accenture’s citizen survey showed that eight in 10
Canadian Internet users have used an eGovernment
site—and that 22 percent say they do so regularly.
Looking ahead, Canadian government CIO Michelle
d’Auray has identified two of the largest challenges
as adequately addressing citizens’ security and privacy
concerns and delivering real interoperability.
The government has taken steps to meet these
challenges. For example, in 2003 it launched epass, an
authentication component of its Secure Channel initiative.
A number of online services already require
epass, with more planned in 2004.
Regarding interoperability, the Canadian government
has already demonstrated through its ability to
deliver high-functioning clusters of services that its
governance model is working. Yet, high-performance
eGovernment implies ease of access and seamlessness
across levels of government, with a very quick
response time. The technical aspects of integration
at this scale will prove a real challenge even to
Canada’s thoughtfully executed program.
Canada is approaching the highest levels of
eGovernment maturity. It will now need to decide
whether it is going to pursue incremental change
or adopt a more dramatic approach to accelerate
service transformation. To accomplish dramatic
transformational change, the government should
consider laying out a revised plan for the next
stages of its transformation agenda. It will need to
garner the right level of political support for the
transformation, review and fine-tune the governance
model to solidify whole-of-government approaches
and determine how the funding can be provided so
as to sustain the transformation. Finally, to gauge
the ultimate success of the transformation, the
Canadian government will need to establish a strong
link between service transformation and the
achievement of its goals and outcomes. Service
transformation will be considered a success if it can
be shown that it leads to a better client experience
and to better, more efficient government operations.
5
Erin Research Inc., Citizens First 3 (2003)
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