A new report by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives says the federal public service could shed almost 60,000 jobs over the next four years as Ottawa looks to cut costs.
Tech could be an answer, but you have to also pause and think about the impact here. When FB or twitter screws up we shrug and move on, when people get improperly audited it could be literally life and death situation, or approval of drug grants for those with “exotic” illnesses. Modernisation of work has to happen however “just throwing tech” at it won’t work. Instead of laying off 60k people they should be trained and equipped with better tools to do their jobs faster and better. So tech would be part if that, tech alone is a sure recipe for disaster. Now if we add government tech procurement standards - I see no hope in tech at all as surely winner of any contract will deliver past due date, over budget and with missing features.
One way to flip it would be mandating procurement OSS products only, produced in the open from day 1. This may help expose deficiencies early on and call BS o over-billed hours if all commits are accounted for. Still you need people with domain knowledge to steer those processes and to be able to actually scope future solutions.
Tech could be an answer, but you have to also pause and think about the impact here. When FB or twitter screws up we shrug and move on, when people get improperly audited it could be literally life and death situation, or approval of drug grants for those with “exotic” illnesses. Modernisation of work has to happen however “just throwing tech” at it won’t work. Instead of laying off 60k people they should be trained and equipped with better tools to do their jobs faster and better. So tech would be part if that, tech alone is a sure recipe for disaster. Now if we add government tech procurement standards - I see no hope in tech at all as surely winner of any contract will deliver past due date, over budget and with missing features.
One way to flip it would be mandating procurement OSS products only, produced in the open from day 1. This may help expose deficiencies early on and call BS o over-billed hours if all commits are accounted for. Still you need people with domain knowledge to steer those processes and to be able to actually scope future solutions.