This chapter focuses on providing recommendations for planning and management of resources needed to launch and operate an effective government information website. It provides insights into selecting the appropriate software that should support all the features of the website. The chapter also illustrates the need for resources in developing and updating content for information websites.
Effective Government Information Websites
Toolkit for Implementation
1. Resource management
Abstract
Planning
Long-term planning and management of technological and human resources are key elements to succeed in the implementation of an effective government information website. Often times, government fail to consider the long-term sustainability of software projects. Information website should not be conceived as “one-off” activities, rather as a dynamic project that is sustainable over time. Proper planning and management of resources ensure the effectiveness and efficiency in the operation and management of information, and support the overall governance of the project.
Comprehensive cost-based estimations
Finding
Cost-based estimations which look at the entire lifecycle of an information website can ensure that the website is performing effectively and is regularly updated.
Recommendation
Web design is a continuous process involving planning, conceptualising, implementing, maintaining and updating. Each phase requires time and involves costs related to procuring software licenses, hardware, human resources, training etc. An estimation of the total costs should be performed at the inception stage to better allocate resources throughout the lifecycle of the website.
Actions for implementation
1. Develop comprehensive cost estimates that take into account the whole lifecycle and long-term sustainability of the information website to make sure that investments deliver intended benefits. Cost-based estimations should include:
a) Cost for acquiring the hardware and software infrastructure: Both the components can be directly purchased or acquired as a service (cloud). In the first case, this includes costs for purchasing servers and associated costs such as housing the servers and cooling systems. In the second case, complex virtual environments like Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure and Amazon AWS can also significantly impact total costs. Other costs to consider can come from server workload, database and storage infrastructure, network bandwidth requirements, installing plugins etc. Additional set up or start-up costs should be considered too, and may include development or content creation costs.
b) Costs for management of infrastructure and the software platform: Once a website is created, it needs to be managed. Moreover, the platform requires human resources, and the management can either be internal or through external contracts.
c) Costs for editing and updating the contents of the website. Depending on the size and functionality of the website, these costs may vary. Websites can be maintained on a quarterly or even monthly basis. The domain name of the website needs to be renewed on a timely basis and can incur costs. This includes both the domain name and the domain extension such as “.com”. Examples of other costs include web hosting costs, email services, customer support (including live chat and email ticketing system) etc. Such costs could also result from law or policy changes, as well as from government re-shuffles, which may require a rearrangement of how information is presented on the website.
d) Costs for maintenance. This entails ordinary maintenance (e.g. cloud costs, support, content update, etc.) and non-routine maintenance (e.g. hardware/software or platform upgrade).
e) Costs for evolution of the platform and its features. To make the website more interactive, analytics and algorithms make predictions based on previous searches. Embedding these features can be costly and should be factored in the overall budget. Similarly, governments should invest in regular performance and satisfaction measurement that inform their continuous improvement. Costs related to migration (e.g. reversibility costs for the migration to a different platform) and those derived from legacy systems should be considered, too. Considerations regarding compatibility with future updates should also be taken into account.
2. Evaluate the “as a Service” option for all the layers of the infrastructure and related maintenance:
a) the hardware (e.g. servers and network devices)
b) the platforms (e.g. web servers and database engines)
c) the software (e.g. out-of-the-box web portal application)
d) software as a service (SaaS) for maintenance and support
3. Evaluate a software solution/framework considering the impact on costs defined above.
Resource requirements for information websites
Software to enable core functionalities
Finding
International experience suggest that software is the core dimension for the development of an information website.
Recommendation
The website should support all functions related to the software applied, the people involved and the content stored. The choice of software and related extensions is important to ensure that the website guarantees analysis and continuous updating.
Actions for implementation
1. Define requirements for software that take into account the dynamic nature of the website. The software should ensure a two-way flow of information, i.e. from the website to the user and vice‑versa. Hence, the software (and its extensions) should be able to “learn” from user queries, search preferences, etc.
2. Consider the use of extensions as they can enhance the functionalities of software. Namely, extensions can add value to the base software through generation of statistics, vocabularies etc. This can help in creating catalogues of information and classify data with the goal of improving the effectiveness of user searches.
Good practice examples
Software learning is done through extensions. These extensions collect and standardise information based on use (e.g. browsing behaviour within a website), helping to generate additional interfaces based on the most useful information. In the context of information websites, such extensions can collect specific information about the queries of users, categorise this information, and generate additional content that is most useful based on the user behaviour.
In Greece, the software of the National Registry of Administrative Procedures was complemented with several extensions to enhance its effectiveness. See relevant good practice in Box 1.1.
Box 1.1. Indicative list of useful extensions: Greek National Registry of Administrative Procedures
An extension is a software that allows the management of accumulated content, to generate useful summaries and statistics, to create vocabularies from the entries of the national registries and to perform multi-faceted semantic queries over the structured data of each procedure.
The Greek Registry employed a software to allow the querying of content within pages as well as the development of catalogues that are directly linked to administrative procedures. For example, Figure 1.1 displays the catalogue of organisations that is available on the home page.
Figure 1.1. Catalogue of organisations
One can select an organisation and see the organisation’s data.
For example, by choosing the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Insular Policy one can get the main description fields – “General information” (“Γενικές Πληροφορίες”) (see Figure 1.2).
Figure 1.2. Description fields
The content classified under this category contains information on the serial number, formal name, webpage, or contact details of the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Insular Policy. Data is also classified by the Procedures it owns (“Διαδικασίες”) – see Figure 1.3.
Figure 1.3. Defined procedures
The registry is updated through these procedures (see Figure 1.4).
Figure 1.4. Updates based on the procedures
This constitutes a comprehensive data repository of interconnected information for the Greek administration, which can be used in a multitude of ways.
Source: (GOV.GR, 2022[1]).
Content management
Finding
Content management of an information website is a continuous process. Populating the content of effective government information websites often goes beyond the remit of the platform owner, given the scope of such websites covering administrative procedures throughout government. Structured collaboration processes can make content management more efficient and self-sustaining over time.
Recommendation
Consider the full scope of resource requirements for 1) populating the information website with key information across government at the time of its creation, 2) continuously updating the website throughout its lifecycle. This entails consideration of necessary governance or management structures, legal mandates, human resources, training and upskilling as well as coordination across the administration.
Actions for implementation
1. Set up a management / coordination structure for collecting information to populate the information website. Consider the specific roles and responsibilities of the website owner vs. the owners of administrative procedures (line ministries).
2. Ensure training of resources dedicated to manipulating the information website (e.g. content creation, content update, etc.).
Good practice examples
The Greek experience of setting up a management structure provides insights into how collaboration across the public administration can make content management of the information website more effective (see Box 1.2).
Box 1.2. Management model for content updates: evidence from the Greek National Registry of Administrative Procedures
An important characteristic of the Greek National Registry of Administrative Procedures is that employees throughout the public administration are in charge of content management of the website. This set-up allows first to collect and register all the procedures and services of the Greek public administration, and second, to continuously update the Registry. To operationalise this modus operandi, the law (L. 4727/2020, L. 4961/2022) and other regulations mandated the involvement of public administration in preparing and updating the content of the website.
The first step was to establish a concrete management structure with clear roles and responsibilities (see Figure 1.5). The structure establishes roles and responsibilities within the Ministry of Digital Governance, as well as within line Ministries. As the owner of the Registry, the Ministry of Digital Governance has the overall management responsibility for the website. Line ministries are expected to contribute according to pre-defined tasks and roles, and have responsibilities regarding content that pertains to their domain. This ensures that information provided in the platform comes as close as possible from the source, i.e. the entity in charge of a particular administrative procedure.
To ensure the continuous update of the information website, the Greek Registry relies on the support of a dedicated community of practice (Ruopp, 1993[2]) with the necessary training and rights to modify content on the website (Figure 1.5). By using a train-the-trainer model, and leveraging on champions across the public administration, the core team is able to ensure regular content update. In practice, 30 trainers have upskilled 1 000 editors/ admin, which in turn oversee the work of up to 4 000 curators.
Figure 1.5. The management and training structure of the project
Source: (GOV.GR, 2022[1]).
References
[1] GOV.GR (2022), Βρείτε τη δημόσια υπηρεσία που θέλετε εύκολα και γρήγορα, https://www.gov.gr/.
[2] Ruopp, R. (1993), “LabNet: Toward a community of practice”, Journal of Science Education and Technology, Vol. 2/1, pp. 305-319, https://doi.org/10.1007/bf00694594.