To understand the current state of education in the digital transformation domain, it is useful to take a look through the lens of established competences and qualifications frameworks. These frameworks help to identify the necessary skills in a certain career path needed in the digitalization journey. It is useful for education institutions in the process of designing curriculum and ensuring the students get the necessary skills to support GovStack approach. Additionally, when designing the curriculum, several issues need to be addressed, as a first step to supporting the long term development of capacity building in the country Digital skills.
The multidisciplinary approach should be considered as it allows students to increase their strengths as well as fill in gaps in their knowledge in the areas of technical skills, service design, ethics, creative problem solving, the regulation of technologies, legislation, and generally in the digital transformation.
The university education should help to improve knowledge of public services design with the use of new technologies. Through gaining an understanding of co-creation, the design process, creative problem solving, human-centric approach in public services, and prototyping the graduates should use to apply new ways to design and implement services with along the new technologies and process re-design.
GovStack Approach supportive curricula are following the European Qualification framework based on the following user profiles categories:
1. Management/ Policy Makers
2. Trainers
3. Service Designers
4. IT personnel
5. End Users.
Table Showing e-CF Stages, and Relevant Competencies recommended for the Stakeholders Involved
The following are the relevant e-competencies for this phase
Relevant e-Competencies
Stakeholders Involved
A.1. Information systems and Business Strategy Alignment
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers, IT personnel
A.2. Service level management
Management/Policy makers, IT personnel
A.3. Business Plan Development
Management/Policy makers, IT personnel
A.4. Product/Service Planning
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers, IT personnel
A.5. Architecture Design
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers, IT personnel
A.6. Application Design
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers, IT personnel
A.7. Technology Trend Monitoring
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers, IT personnel
A.8. Sustainability Management
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers, IT personnel
A.9. Innovating
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers, IT personnel
A.10. User Experience
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers, IT personnel, Trainers
The building phase is the second step
The following are the relevant e-competencies for this phase.
Relevant e-Competencies
Stakeholders Involved
B.1. Application Development
IT personnel, Service Designers
B.2 Component Integration
IT personnel, Service Designers
B.3 Testing
IT personnel, Service Designers
B.4 Solution Deployment
IT personnel, Service Designers
B.5. Documentation Production
Management/Policy makers, IT personnel, Service Designers
B.6. ICT Systems Engineering
Management/Policy makers, IT personnel
The running phase is the third phase
The following are the relevant e-competencies for this phase.
Relevant e-Competencies
Stakeholders Involved
C.1. User Support
IT personnel, End Users
C.2. Change Support
Management/policy makers, IT personnel Trainers
C.3. Service Delivery
Management/policy makers, IT personnel Trainers
C.4. Problem Management
Management/policy makers, IT personnel
C.5. Systems Management
Management/policy makers, IT personnel
The enabling phase is the fourth phase
The following are the relevant e-competencies for this phase.
Relevant e-Competencies
Stakeholders Involved
D.1. Information Security Strategy Development
Management/Policy makers, IT personnel
D.2. ICT Quality Strategy Development
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers, IT personnel
D.3. Education and Training Provision
Management/Policy makers, Trainers
D.4. Purchasing
Management/Policy makers
D.5. Sales Development
Management/Policy makers
D.6. Digital Marketing
Management/Policy makers
D.7. Data Science and Analytics
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers, IT personnel
D.8 Contract Management
Management/Policy makers
D.9. Personnel Development
Management/Policy makers, Trainers
D.10. Information and Knowledge Management
Management/Policy makers, Trainers
D.11. Needs Identification
Management/Policy makers, Trainers
The managing phase is the last phase
The following are the relevant e-competencies for this phase.
Relevant e-Competencies
Stakeholders Involved
E.1. Forecast Development
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers
E.2. Project and Portfolio Management
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers
E.3. Risk Management
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers, IT personnel
E.4. Relationship Management
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers
E.5. Process Improvement
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers, IT personnel
E.6. ICT Quality Management
Management/Policy makers, IT personnel
E.7. Business Change Management
Management/Policy makers, Trainers, IT personnel
E.8. Information Security Management
Management/Policy makers, IT personnel
E.9. Information Systems Governance
Management/Policy makers, IT personnel
Management/Policy makers, Service Designers, IT personnel (Recommended Curriculum Skills Matrix based on CEN e-CF Framework)
Additionally to EQF the study programmes should follow the Computing Curricula 2020, CC2020 approach in terms of the elements of knowledge.
This knowledge dimension of competency represents foundational and technical components that are very relevant in order to implement GovStack's vision of digitalization.
In order to sustain a digital society, it is equally important to continuously monitor industry trends and emerging new technologies. There is need to establish a digital talent archive that will ensure continuous sustainability in a country's capacity strength.
Skills and Competences to support academic programmes
The successful implementation of the GovStack Approach requires countries to consider a long-term strategy that accounts for the kind of academic support that is needed to achieve digitalization goals. From a short-term perspective, the general GovStack approach is sufficient to keep the GovStack eco-system up and running. However, in order to foster sustainability within country digital teams, academic support is a valuable asset to ensure that long-term goals are met.
While developing university programmes at the Masters' level, universities should consider not only theoretical approaches, but also labor market needs based on different competency and qualification frameworks. These frameworks reflect the skills that are needed in different domains within digitalization.
The EAPC Competency framework is destined for innovative professionals working in public sector organizations. It describes the eight skills that are necessary to promote innovation in the public sector: self-organizations, independent learning, creativity, communication, teamwork, networking, capturing trends and risk management. The framework reflects three primary vector:, the individual, the team, and the organization. To achieve innovation, the individual needs to be action-oriented; the team needs to be cooperative; and the organization must be sustainable.
This kind of competency framework aligns with the GovStack Approach as it supports co-design and an agile mindset. As such, it is easy to combine its iterative style with the training plans that GovStack envisages for capacity building.
This type of competency framework serves well GovStack approach as it supports co-design and agile way of thinking. In that way it is easy to combine iterative style with the training plans which are meant for the capacity building.
(ISCO) is one of the main international classifications for which the International Labor Organization (ILO) is responsible. ISCO is a tool for organizing jobs into a clearly defined set of groups according to the tasks and duties undertaken in the job. ISCO-08 is a four-level hierarchically structured classification that allows all jobs to be classified into 436 unit groups. They are aggregated into 130 minor groups, 43 sub-major groups and 10 major groups.[1]
Created by the European Committee for Standardization (CEN), it has been designed to communicate the competencies required by ICT professionals.
It establishes 41 competences across 5 proficiency levels and provides knowledge and skills examples. The framework distinguishes 5 e-competence areas based on the IT macro processes PLAN –BUILD –RUN – ENABLE – MANAGE.[2][3]
The Digital Competence Framework for Citizen (DigComp) provides a common understanding of what digital competence is. The integrated DigComp 2.2 framework provides more than 250 new examples of knowledge, skills and attitudes that help citizens engage confidently, critically and safely with digital technologies, and new and emerging ones such as systems driven by artificial intelligence (AI).
It covers all kinds of competences and is not limited to IT capabilities only. The framework establishes 8 levels of knowledge, skills, and abilities to apply knowledge and skills with autonomy and responsibility.
e-QF is considered an instrument of comparing qualifications across countries and institutions. [4] As of September 2021, 35 countries have linked their national qualification systems to e-QF.[5][6]
It examines undergraduate curricular guidelines in computer engineering, computer science, cybersecurity, information systems, information technology, software engineering, and data science (under development). Taking into account the trends in computing and requirements of the workplaces, the report underlines the transition from knowledge-based learning to competency-based learning.
It also recommends including cybersecurity and data science to curricula.[7] Also, the report creators have come up with the list of draft competencies in each of the researched areas.
It includes 97 skills across 6 categories: Strategy and architecture, Change and transformation, Development and implementation, Delivery and operation, Skills and quality, Relationships and engagement.
SFIA introduces 7 different levels of responsibility, at which skills can be exercised. However, the seven levels are not applicable to all skills, as some are necessary at entry level and some at senior roles.[8]
An example of the SFIA application can be found in the Australian work on the creation of the Digital Career Pathways Framework [9] a supporting tool to identify career routes and skill gap.
The framework uses e-CF to describe professional roles. The roles are described in a unified manner (name, mission, description of significant activities and tasks, list of competences, trends and factors in change for the job-role, example of a typical deliverable).
The roles are divided into 7 families: Organization and management of changes to the information system, Project management, Application life cycle, Provision of infrastructure and maintenance in operational condition, Support and assistance, Security, Operational Management, Data, Supplier relationships.[10]
In addition to German Qualifications Framework[11], which covers a broad scope of qualifications, The German Advanced IT Training System provides a system of career profiles of specialists in the computer, software and telecommunications sectors.[12]
e-GCF provides along with the toolkit easy steps on how to structure an e-Governance team and how to conduct fact-based training needs analysis for competency benchmarking. It includes 19 identified e-governance roles categorized into 2 major roles: 8 administrative and 11 technical roles.
It covers all kinds of competencies and is not limited to IT capabilities only. The e-GCF aligns competencies across four dimensions: Professional Skills Set, Knowledge Set, Behavioral Set, and Qualifications Set. It also recommends improvements in recruitment processes and outcomes, and performance evaluation.
GovStack uses a descriptive and e-learning approach, that is the GovStack Learning Management System to train the stakeholders.
The main learning outcomes to support the GovStack's approach will give
Enabling an understanding of the different competencies needed for digital journey
Informing different co-design techniques and applying this knowledge to implement the GovStack Approach
Learning Objectives
Within GovStack approach, it is very important to educate the future leaders of the digital transformation who are able to implement the GovStack vision. As GovStack requires various knowledge in the field of transformation the academic education path should follow the GovStack's standard users profiles.
The main areas which should be covered in the masters programs are as follows:
Digital Government where the purpose to get students to recognize what is different about governing in an era filled with pervasive digital technologies.
The building blocks of the digital government which is about understanding that government digital systems are made up from components, and that the choice of which components to use is critical. It also lays out the idea of 'Government as a Platform'.
Service orientation in the public sector which is about using practices and technologies of the digital era to rapidly and continually improve government services and policies as well move towards proactive life event services.
Service design where students learn why public servants need to be focused on users and their needs. Instructors will help students understand when and why they will need to apply design methods to solve problems.
Interoperability and next generation government architecture where students will learn about single-source governance and security protocols to be implemented across all data assets
Data management is to help understand statistics as well identify opportunities to use data to solve real world government problems. The practical challenges related to data access and privacy/security
Automatization and data where purpose is to help students to be aware that digital era governments create and manage data as a function for every activity to allow participatory AI solutions for public service a
Participatory governance is to help students understand what it means to ‘work in the open’ in government, and to explain the many different interpretations and manifestations of ‘openness’ that are applied in modern governments.
Legal framework to help students to anticipate the most common barriers related to legal acts and standards which government encounter within real government functions
Identity management and security in networked world where students learn about identity management in data governance – how it to ensure data quality and security through access controls across critical data systems. The topic sums up the policies, processes, standards, metrics, and roles that ensure that data is used effectively to help an organization realize its objectives
As GovStack approach is very focused on country engagement and involves much collaborative tools and techniques, a teaching strategy should follow a logic as listed below:
Design thinking approach, to stimulate creative problem solving, teamwork and action research, and guide participants to develop human-centered solutions;
Project-based learning and team-working on practical projects and real challenges across different types of public institutions, increasing the confidence of students in adopting/procuring the right technology for the relevant societal needs;
Active learning, encouraging peer exchange, dialogue and debate, to create an extensive ecosystem around the adoption of GovStack approach beyond the duration of the programme, thus aiming in the long run to contribute to a shift in the mindset of public officials and policy makers;
The expected learning outcomes should ensure the program meets the following:
Knowing the current potential of technology and data and being able to critically assess their social and ethical impacts,
a. Understanding technology that is used in the delivery of the digital state.
b. Learning to operate with technology and how to create human centric government e-services.
Knowing to design / plan / implement / evaluate a practical digital transformation project for an up-to-date range of public services,
a. Developing strategic management abilities,
b. Learning to analyze and propose digital concepts for governance and public services.
Understanding what digital transformation is, what the different applicative domains are with a specific focus on governance and public service transformation, what features it can have and how to convey services to companies and experts,
a. Understanding the state-of-the-art of digital transformation and the available market solutions with a level deep enough to start implementation,
b. Learning to manage innovative procurement and public-private partnership in public services design and delivery.
Making judgements is the ability to think critically and analyze different use cases for digital transformation through public services in society; ability to create public value through innovative design and implement projects.
Project groupwork and communication skills - autonomously and in groups, students develop the ability to present and discuss their ideas and the attitude to negotiate in teamwork.
The academic study program should serve as an enabler of providing knowledge and skills at the intersection of technology, business and management, design thinking and policy sides. The reason for such an interdisciplinary approach lies in the needs of the labor market.
