SAP Drive Public Sector Innovation and Agility
South Africa — SAP Africa today kicked off its public sector innovation roadshow in Johannesburg, to highlight how the SAP innovation solutions portfolio including, cloud and big data, supports all levels of government in order to facilitate socio-economic change throughout Africa, governments are looking at innovative ways of connecting the industry players with their communities. SAP is working with government organisations across the world, to offer the right mix of technology required, to help government address some of the socio economic challenges facing the continent, including unemployment, quality of life, service delivery and economic opportunities for small and midsize enterprises. In addition, SAP reinforced its committed to driving business in Africa with the ultimate objective of improving people’s lives through deployment of innovative, industry specific solutions mainly in the public sector, energy & natural resources, telecommunications and infrastructure by training new consultants in the next seven years to help governments and private sector to improve the way they do business and ultimately drive prosperity through job creation.
Innovation in the public sector is critical to help governments, utilities agencies, employees and citizens to quickly tackle issues from education, healthcare to revenue collection management. Through the SAP Cloud and Big Data portfolios, government now has the agility and confidence to deliver services, bridge the economic gaps and drive transformation across the private sector. “The labour market ecosystem does not generally create jobs, but fulfils the support role to the private sector and, more specifically, SMEs in creating sustainable jobs that strengthen communities both from an economic and a social perspective. Governments are responsible for creating the proper environment for the private sector and businesses to engage, grow, and prosper, both socially and economically. Traditionally governments tended to focus on providing citizens monetary and non-monetary benefits and a robust collection engine, thereby creating a welfare state,” says Danny Van Heck, head of Public Services at SAP EMEA
Leveraging more than 40 years’ experience in helping more than 14,800 public sector organisations customers around the world to run better, and SAP solutions provide government with the flexibility to consume such innovative technology. SAP is uniquely positioned to understand the challenges and opportunities that government organisations face in changing the way they deliver employee services, partner and constituent solutions. This is evident through the experience and ranking of SAPs public cloud applications portfolio as the best in the world in areas of: human capital management, procurement, business networks and social collaboration. “It is clear that only innovative governments who embrace technology will be able to deliver meaningful transformations in the way they conduct their business and deliver services to citizens. There is dire need for innovative collaboration between public, private, and non-profit sectors to deliver services efficiently”, says Kudzai Dana, Head of Public Sector at SAP Africa.
One of the biggest fall backs of employment programmes is the vast amount of data available online, also known as Big Data, and with the correct partner Big Data can be utilised to create a valuable solution to the crisis of unemployment. Through innovation and the correct partners, government is able to decrease the number of unemployed by providing a platform where job seekers and potential employers are able to interact. The wave of social media, the increased usage of mobile technology across Africa and the high levels of security available from reputable partners, form part of the solution to the problems faced by government.
An example of the success of such a platform can be found in the European Union (EU), where a collaborative effort between government and leading technology industry players resulted in the Academy Cube (http://www.academy-cube.eu/). Academy Cube is an online portal platform providing access to online training, employment opportunities and database of job seekers. There are approximately 700 job openings available to members whilst providing government with an insight into what skills are required versus skills available and better understanding of the economic labour demands and planning of resources accordingly.
An African example of how technology is transforming government initiatives is evident from the Konza Techno City in Kenya which is part of the Kenyan Government’s 2030 plan to drive employment and skills development opportunities. This is a self-sustainable initiative where IT professionals are trained and further developed to meet the dynamic needs of the country. “We are confident that the South Africa government and its neighbouring countries are ready to embrace technology and leapfrog, however the process requires, successful partnership between government and private sector, inclusive of SMEs and our public sector solution portfolio fully supports the government and Labour market business imperatives to help close the gap between strategy and execution” concludes Dana.
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