By Indranil Mukherjee, Senior Vice President and Service Offering Head, Infosys Salesforce Services
The modern citizen’s expectations have been fundamentally reshaped by their interactions with private sector players, who go to extraordinary lengths to provide phenomenal customer experience leveraging digital channels and emerging technologies. They now demand government services that match this level of sophistication. The core aspects of a citizen centric service delivery model, powered by digitalisation include the below:
⦁ Faster Processing, akin to the instantaneous responses received afrom private sector services
⦁ Hyper-personalised experiences, which are tailored based on specific needs, preferences and personas
⦁ Enhanced accessibility through multilingual digital interfaces, mobile-first designs, and formats that are accessible to individuals with disabilities
⦁ Ease of Navigation through simplified workflows and user-friendly interfaces reducing the learning curve and improving adoption
⦁ Transparency and Accountability through built-in compliance and reporting features enhancing the credibility of public services
Placing citizens’ experience at the core of service delivery involves designing systems that are intuitive, accessible, inclusive and built on a human-centric design. Apart from boosting citizen and employee experience through seamless multi-channel engagements, digitalisation initiatives can also improve overall operational efficiency through means like fraud detection and prevention, intelligent resource allocation, and automating routine administrative tasks.
Digital Modernisation with Data and AI as the Key Driver
A robust foundation built on data-centricity, cloud platforms, APIs, and AI-first strategies is essential for driving this transformation. By integrating disparate signals and data streams from various citizen-facing systems, public services can evolve into a cohesive, interconnected ecosystem. This approach breaks down silos between different government departments and agencies, enabling real-time data sharing and collaboration. Interconnected public services facilitate seamless user experiences, allowing citizens to move effortlessly between related services, such as applying for unemployment benefits, updating personal information, or registering for healthcare, without redundant steps and going through cumbersome processes.
On a broader scale, this interconnectedness enables predictive analytics and cross-agency insights, helping governments anticipate citizen needs and address potential issues before they arise. For example, data from housing assistance, employment services, and healthcare programs can be combined to offer proactive support to vulnerable populations. Digital identity and Smart City initiatives have shown remarkable results in reducing service delivery time and documentation requirements while significantly improving citizen satisfaction scores.
Gen AI and Agentic AI can augment citizen-facing services with end-to-end self-service capabilities. These capabilities include intuitive, context-aware search and intelligent interactions via dynamic chat interfaces, automated online applications (e.g., unemployment insurance, driver licenses, vehicle registration), and streamlined registry services (birth, death). Agentic AI-enabled platforms can also revolutionise case management, contract handling, recruitment processes, and personalised healthcare delivery by autonomously managing routine tasks, anticipating user needs, and offering tailored solutions. Such intelligent, goal-oriented systems will make government interactions not only seamless, round-the-clock and less time-consuming but also more adaptive and user-centric.
Looking toward the future, other emerging technologies present new opportunities for public service transformation. Blockchain technology offers potential for more transparent governance. The convergence of Extended Reality (XR) technologies and advanced telecommunications will radically transform citizen experiences with public services by enabling immersive, personalised interactions that transcend physical limitations – imagine speaking with government representatives through lifelike avatars from home, participating in virtual town halls where you can see and interact with 3D models of proposed neighborhood changes, or receiving healthcare consultations with AR overlays showing real-time medical information. The application of these technologies has so far been concentrated in a few niche areas, but broader adoption might follow as compute becomes more affordable.
The Way Forward
Public service organisations face significant challenges in meeting these expectations, primarily due to legacy system constraints. Most government institutions operate on monolithic architectures that resist modification and maintain siloed data repositories that prevent holistic citizen views. The success of these transformation initiatives depends on precise strategic planning, clearly defined objectives, and strong change management practices. Building workforce digital capabilities through comprehensive training and establishing clear feedback channels are crucial for sustaining momentum and fostering a culture of continuous improvement. Collaborations with technology providers and innovators can further accelerate transformation efforts. Moreover, prioritising Responsible AI governance is critical to safeguarding citizens from potential risks of AI like bias, security breaches etc. and ensuring compliance with evolving regulations, such as the EU AI Act.