Policy in the data age: Data enablement for the common good


Karim Tadjeddine and Martin Lundqvist of McKinsey: “Like companies in the private sector, governments from national to local can smooth the process of digital transformation—and improve services to their “customers,” the public—by adhering to certain core principles. Here’s a road map.

By virtue of their sheer size, visibility, and economic clout, national, state or provincial, and local governments are central to any societal transformation effort, in particular a digital transformation. Governments at all levels, which account for 30 to 50 percent of most countries’ GDP, exert profound influence not only by executing their own digital transformations but also by catalyzing digital transformations in other societal sectors (Exhibit 1).

The tremendous impact that digital services have had on governments and society has been the subject of extensive research that has documented the rapid, extensive adoption of public-sector digital services around the globe. We believe that the coming data revolution will be even more deeply transformational and that data enablement will produce a radical shift in the public sector’s quality of service, empowering governments to deliver better constituent service, better policy outcomes, and more-productive operations….(More)”