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Infrastructure

Two aspects to infrastructure require early consideration: the technical infrastructure, and the governance infrastructure. Initiatives to deliver these are detailed below.

Establish a governance structure

A formal governance structure will be implemented for the New Zealand Government Portal. The E-Government Unit in consultation with agencies will design the governance structure. This is a pre-requisite to implementing the portal strategy.

The governance structure will pursue the all-important customer-centric theme in the establishment and continuing development of the portal. It will be accountable for:

  • establishing and managing the governance framework including funding models

  • implementing the portal strategy

  • owning and managing the New Zealand Government Portal environment and common infrastructure

  • developing and managing the Trust Charter

  • developing and managing the Quality of Service Charter for the portal

  • developing and managing Quality of Information and Service standards with agencies

  • developing and managing the Infomediary Code of Conduct

  • collaborating with non-governmental agencies and the private sector to offer value-added services

  • maximising brand value

  • initiating and directing other implementation projects.

This governance structure should:

  • be consistent with other governance structures established for whole-of-government initiatives

  • initially comprise representation of government agencies and local government, and possibly non-governmental agencies in the future

  • align with the business models adopted for service delivery.

Business models

The long-term success of the portal depends on establishing a viable business model that can justify the investment in advanced technologies and support infrastructure and their future management. This is especially true in the context of offering integrated services and personalisation, which require significant investment in advanced technologies such as a generic exchange for cross-agency process integration and a customer relationship management module for personalisation. A number of government portals languish (and possibly disappear) over time because of the inability to justify these ongoing investments.

Commercial experience with websites that provide only digital information content indicates the difficulty of implementing a viable business case based on information delivery alone. This will be even more difficult in a government context, where the opportunity to leverage brand value for consumer marketing may be limited - if it is present at all.

Innovative models that bring private sector investment to bear do exist, however. Most make their revenues from some sort of transaction-based pricing for services or information.

As well as the services it can offer to target customer segments, the portal can offer a range of extra services to external organisations and even governments. Consider:

  • New Zealand Government Portal could provide consulting services to establish a fully operational portal for other government agencies and other countries (New Zealand Government Portal as a consulting firm).

  • The portal technology and management infrastructure to manage the portals and possibly the content for other (small?) government agencies, other countries (New Zealand Government Portal as a government portal ASP).

  • The New Zealand Government Portal could provide a portal for enabling New Zealand Small and Medium Size Enterprise start-ups to participate in the world economy. The portal could assist in breaking down the Digital Divide by becoming a Incubator Portal for these new businesses.

  • It could provide market research information from portal content (as Statistics NZ does today).

A high-level market assessment has identified these business models:

  • Infomediary (free sub-contracting). The portal information is used by an external organisation under the 'Infomediary Code of Conduct'

  • Information provider. Selected, processed government services/information are provided at a price to an external agency following the same model as a Market Research organisation (such as PC INFOS from Statistics NZ).

  • Sub-contracting. Components of the portal are managed by an external organisation under a service level agreement (e.g., facilities management)

  • Technology/process outsourcing. Portal components or service processes are outsourced, but the asset is owned by the supplier (e.g., change of address process).

  • Technology/process leasing/rental. Portal components or services processes are rented on an as-and-when-needed basis (e.g., an electronic survey service).

  • Joint investments. Joint investments using a multitude of risk/reward models between suppliers and organisations such as in the case of CNN.com or ACOL.com.

A combination of these options would result in the optimum structure.

Establish an operational team and resources to operate

The existing infrastructure is insufficient for the job. The New Zealand Government Portal will require an improved operational capability. The following roles/functions are required to deliver a portal capable of meeting goals and adapting to changing demands:

Relationship management which manages all the relationships with government and non-government agencies from a sales, marketing and brand management viewpoint, customer relationships from a service delivery viewpoint and partnership management for managing the relationships with suppliers/partners including infomediaries.

Service level management, responsible for ongoing service delivery.

Portal content quality management.

Operational management, including

  • site management

  • network management

  • cyber-librarian

  • editor

  • security management

  • user account management

  • helpdesk/user support.

An ongoing budget beyond that currently provided to the E-Government program would be required. Once established, this service can be incorporated within an existing agency infrastructure. An analysis of operational requirements and resources required will be undertaken by the E-Government unit, and options for funding discussed within the governing body.

Identify with agencies what they must do

The portal cannot succeed without agency participation. Agencies must understand very clearly what is required from them over the next two to three years for the portal to succeed. The E-Government unit will undertake communication and education for agencies, incorporating:

  • understanding E-Government (including this portal) strategy, vision, goals and principles, and adopting the principles

  • provision of metadata to enable location of services and appropriate information

  • compliance with Web standards

  • using shared services such as change of address or single user sign on.

  • ensuring reciprocal service level agreements between portal and agencies.

Protect portal and infrastructure from misuse

The portal will be protected from misuse. Appropriate security architecture will be designed to protect the portal from denial of service attacks, cyber vandalism and other security threats. Secure links will be established, as appropriate, between the portal and those agencies delivering the information and services.

Implement robust architecture

Investment in the portal architecture and operational environment is needed to achieve a robust architecture capable of providing around-the-clock portal services. This will require investment in appropriate hardware and software infrastructure that will be reliable, secure, scalable and designed to avoid any single point of failure. The architecture will need to support load balancing, peak demands and a full deployment environment incorporating formal migration from development and testing to the live environment. The development of this may require leverage of existing agency infrastructures and/or an RFI process.

Acquire an appropriate product suite

A product suite is needed that will build services, support personalisation and enable integrated service delivery. As the portal matures it will move from being a simple redirection and search service to one that provides some shared and integrated services with linkages into agency systems, and potentially some content and support for secure connectivity. The delivery of shared or potentially integrated processes via the New Zealand Government Portal will require an appropriate development and deployment environment. This environment will include support for interoperability, security services and other factors.

Introducing integrated service delivery may require new components to exchange information seamlessly with agency systems such as active repository and ability the to conduct multi-phase transactions. Personalisation might demand that the front-end of the portal be enabled with customer relationship management functionality.


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