The Digital Transformation of Norway's Public Sector

1. Assessment and recommendations

Abstract

To inform Norway’s new digitalisation strategy, the OECD has identified several strategic objectives and recommendations that could support Norway in building on its progress to ensure that the country has a digital government that is fit for the future.

Based on these findings, the Government could consider incorporating the strategic objectives below into its new digitalisation strategy, which could be achieved by addressing the associated recommendations:

Table 1.1. Overview of the OECD’s assessment and recommendations

Strategic objectives	Recommendations
Digital Governance: Leveraging the opportunity of a new minister and dedicated ministry, Norway could enhance its digital governance model to increase coherency and coordination and make the best use of public resources.	Recommendation 1: The Government could bolster its governance of digital initiatives in the public sector across the investment lifecycle, including standardised decision-making and approval processes, stronger coordination mechanisms, prioritisation, and oversight of digital government investments, and measures to promote greater collaboration, communication, and dedicated funding for shared initiatives. Recommendation 2: The Government could evaluate the environmental impact of its digitalisation strategy and consider how the digitalisation of the public sector can support a ‘twin transition’ alongside a move to a more sustainable and ‘green’ public sector, including the resources, funding, and collaboration required to support it. Recommendation 3: The Government could promote digital-ready legislation to support its digitalisation efforts by addressing ‘green digital’ and access to private sector data or information to enable greater value creation. It could also adopt legislations covering explicit rights to outline the expectations and protections for citizens when interacting digitally with the public sector.
Digital Government Investments: Norway could aim to have a strategic and integrated whole-of-government governance model for digital government investments to ensure that it realises the intended benefits of its investments.	Recommendation 4: The Government could advance towards an end-to-end approach by integrating the different phases of the investments cycle under one consolidated process. Additional efforts are also required to enhanced cohesiveness on lower capital-intensive investments. Recommendation 5: The Government could adopt a portfolio management approach to foster agility and experimentation in the implementation of digital government investments. Recommendation 6: The Government could leverage data to better monitor the implementation of digital government investments and integrate the existing monitoring tools to strengthen transparency and accountability. This strategic use of data could support a whole-of-government monitoring of digital government investments and maximise coherence and value for money.
GovTech: Norway could aim to reintegrate GovTech into its public sector to support the development of innovative solutions to public sector challenges, particularly in line with key focus areas like AI and the ‘twin transition’ of green and digital transformations.	Recommendation 7: The Government could consider how elements of the StartOff programme could be continued or developed further to support key focus areas for digital government to maximise its impact and return-on-investment. Recommendation 8: The Government could address the GovTech Building Blocks and Enablers to facilitate GovTech collaborations across Norway’s public sector, particularly around the capacities for collaboration and experimentation and the resources and support needed for implementation.
Digital Public Infrastructure: Norway could aim to evolve its national joint solutions to ensure that they are secure and resilient, support interactions across sectors, and maximise value to users.	Recommendation 9: The Government could strengthen the overall governance and funding model for the ‘joint national solutions’, focusing on the need for continuous investment throughout their lifecycle. Recommendation 10: The Government could prioritise the development of 'joint national solutions’ that support interaction, collaboration, and interoperability across sectors and domains to incentivise uptake, increase user satisfaction, and improve service delivery, based on stakeholder input. Recommendation 11: The Government could prioritise the development of 'joint national solutions’ that have already been identified by Norway as critical, such as common solutions for secure messaging.
Data access, sharing and re-use: Norway could take concrete steps in enhancing data access, sharing and re-use in the public sector by ensuring the right data governance foundations, the systematic use of guidelines and standards, and by monitoring the impact of data sharing initiatives.	Recommendation 12: The Government could consider creating the role of a National Chief Data Officer and agency-level data stewards to advance data sharing and reuse coherently at the central and local level in line with new national targets. Inspiration could be drawn from the Chief Data Officer role in the U.S federal government, adapted to the Norwegian context and public governance model. Recommendation 13: The Government could prioritise the systematic adoption and use of the common standards for information management under the Framework for Information Management to support data quality & re-use and implementation of the 'once only' principle. Recommendation 14: As part the collaboration between Digdir and Statistics Norway, and the new digitalisation strategy, it would be good to consider collecting statistics to help measure the impact of data sharing initiatives, including open data, on the Norwegian economy and society.
Artificial Intelligence: As it seeks to expand its integration into the public sector, Norway could aim for a more strategic and coordinated approach to AI that ensures that its use is effective, responsive, efficient, and accountable.	Recommendation 15: The Government could formalise its guidance on the use of AI in the public sector and implement the provisions of the EU AI Act to drive the transparency and explainability of AI algorithms that are being used across the public sector. Recommendation 16: The Government could consider strengthening the monitoring and oversight of the portfolio of AI projects in the public sector and formalise its approach for pursuing new initiatives to maximise the impact of its investment. In line with Recommendations 5-6, this can be done through stronger oversight and evaluation of AI projects to maximise their collective impact and support their successful implementation. Recommendation 17: In coordination with the National Competent Authority under the EU AI Act and in alignment with its provisions, the Government could develop guidance and mechanisms for the monitoring and evaluation of the use of AI in the public sector. This may include regular internal audits, performance monitoring, and impact assessments.
Digital Talent: Norway could aim to have a more strategic approach to digital talent across its public sector, better coordinating efforts to attract, retain, allocate and develop talent.	Recommendation 18: The Government could strengthen the coordination between Digdir and DFØ to enhance Norway’s approach to attracting and retaining digital talent in the public sector. Recommendation 19: The Government could develop a strategy for digital talent and skills in the public sector. Building on the competence model, the government can benefit from a strategic approach to the institutional efforts to attract, retain and develop talent in the public sector. This strategy could connect individual initiatives with specific goals and targets to secure accountability and maximise impact. Recommendation 20: The Government could establish structured and coordinated efforts to attract, maintain, develop and allocate digital talent across the public sector. By fostering cross-institutional learning and facilitating mobility, the country can enhance the attractiveness of the public function and improve the allocation of digital talent across the public sector.
Service Design and Delivery: Overcoming the challenges of a decentralised model, Norway could aim to evolve its design and delivery of government services to ensure that it is responsive to the changing needs and expectations of users.	Recommendation 21: The Government could implement mandatory service standards to build a more coherent approach across a decentralised delivery model for government services. Recommendation 22: The Government could integrate the ‘Once Only’ principle to promote the reuse of data to minimise administrative burden on users and enable more proactive government services. Recommendation 23: The Government could develop an omnichannel strategy to enable a more consistent user experience across all channels, as an extension of the digital experience, as well as to ensure services remain accessible and inclusive of different users’ needs. Recommendation 24: The Government could incorporate more comprehensive performance monitoring to reinforce a data-driven approach to future service enhancements.