White Paper Contents

Citizen Connect: Improve Government Service and Reduce Costs White Paper Contents 2 What You Will Learn 2 Challenges of Citizen Interactions with Government 5 Architectural Framework for Citizen Connect 5 Architecture Methodology 6 Architecture Principles 7 Building Blocks 7 Cornerstone 1: Knowledge and Process Management 7 Cornerstone 2: Citizen-Authority Interaction 8 Cornerstone 3: Collaborative Work 8 Cornerstone 4: Government-Grade Network 9 Business Transformation Example: When a Citizen Moves to a New Residence 13 Citizen Connect Solution Architecture Components 14 Unified Communications 14 IP Telephony 14 Presence Information 14 Conferencing 15 Contact Center 15 Intelligent Contact Management (ICM) 15 Interactive Voice Response 15 Email Routing 16 Web Collaboration 16 Agent Front-End 16 Expert Front-End 17 Reporting 17 Integrated Applications 17 Customer Relationship Management 17 Ticketing Tool 17 Knowledge Management 18 Case Studies 18 State of Texas Health and Human Services Commission, United States 18 London Borough of Hillingdon, United Kingdom 19 Major U.S. County 20 Conclusion 20 For More Information 2 © 2011 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. What You Will Learn By making it easier for citizens to obtain information and submit service requests, governments improve citizen satisfaction and can increase contact center efficiency to save taxpayer dollars. This white paper, intended for government IT staff, introduces a secure, open, standards-based architectural framework called Citizen Connect. The framework has four cornerstones: • Knowledge management • Citizen-authority interaction • Collaborative working • Government-grade network, which serves as the foundation for the other three cornerstones Government IT groups that are building contact centers can use this white paper as a planning guide. It is not intended as a technical implementation guide. Challenges of Citizen Interactions with Government In the 21st century, governments worldwide are transforming the way they deliver services to constituents, to increase citizen satisfaction, empower the workforce to be more productive, and extract the maximum value from budgets. Effective solutions require attention to people, processes, and technology. Today, citizens that need to obtain information, request services, or check on request status must overcome the following hurdles: • Multiple government telephone numbers: Callers often do not know which department to contact for a particular service. Government service suffers when callers must hang up and call back. In addition, the need to answer misdirected calls increases staffing requirements. • Inconvenient hours: Citizens overwhelmingly prefer to contact government using the telephone, according to surveys in different countries, but call centers are typically only open from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., when many citizens are at work. • Lack of collaboration tools: If a caller has a question or issue that the agency employee cannot answer, the employee cannot easily reach out to experts in other departments or agencies. Instead, the employee must initiate a series of calls and emails and get back to the caller later. The delays can frustrate citizens and add to employee workload. • Websites with limited value: Most government websites only provide access to information and services for one department or agency, and do not provide a click-to-chat option for visitors who cannot find information or need help with form filling. Now governments around the world are empowering citizens to resolve any non-emergency issue by calling a single number or visiting a single web portal. Examples of issues that citizens can resolve in this way include: • Requesting garbage collection, graffiti removal, noise abatement, and so on • Taking all actions related to a move to a new city: registering for local taxes, finding a school, obtaining a parking permit, and so on • Reporting a family member’s death to all relevant agencies at once • Taking care of issues related to a new child by applying for child allowances, obtaining information about nurseries, and so on • Obtaining health and human services, such as requesting social benefits, health services, and other social services 3 © 2011 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Governments improve citizen service and reduce costs when they develop a Citizen Connect with the following characteristics: • Provides a single phone number and single website for all government non-emergency services • Gives citizens a choice of interaction channels: telephone, email, web, or fax • Offers self-service options so that citizens find information, request non-emergency services, and monitor service progress 24 hours a day • Enables employees to immediately find available experts in other agencies and departments and collaborate with them to resolve citizen issues Table 1 lists the benefits of Citizen Connect. Table 1 Citizens and Government Benefit from Simpler Interactions Benefits for Citizens Benefits to Government Anytime, anywhere access to services, from home, Increased employee productivity through automating routine tasks—for work, or local government offices example, by eliminating the need to re-enter data that the caller has already provided Convenience of requesting any non-emergency service through a single phone number or website, Reduced staffing requirements because of self-service options plus self-service options Increased first-call resolution by enabling employees to reach out across Choice of contact channel: voice, web, email, or fax departmental barriers to collaborate and implementing reliable Knowledge Bases Ability to track request progress through self-service channels Enhanced public safety from decreasing the number of non-emergency calls that emergency operators answer from citizens who do not know what Increased ease of setting up business offices in number to call other countries Additional channel for communicating with the public—for example, announcing a weather-related emergency on a website or as a recording in call center queues Compliance with regulatory requirements such as the EU Services Directive Better insight into nature of caller requests through comprehensive reporting, enabling continual process improvements Ability to distribute calls, emails, faxes, and chat requests to agents anywhere on the network, including teleworkers 4 © 2011 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Architectural Framework for Citizen Connect Architecture Methodology Cisco has designed a comprehensive Citizen Connect architecture to reduce complexity and enable new, more efficient business processes for government interactions with citizens (Figure 1). To develop the architecture, Cisco used The Open Group Architecture Framework (TOGAF) Architecture Development Methodology (ADM), an open, standards- based framework that provides a comprehensive approach to the design, planning, implementation, and governance of enterprise information architectures. For more information, visit: www.opengroup.org/togaf/ Figure 1 Development Method Used for Citizen Connect 5 © 2011 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Architecture Principles The following table summarizes government’s main goals for citizen interactions and how the Citizen Connect architecture addresses those goals. Table 2 The Citizen Connect Framework Addresses Government Business Goals for Citizen Interactions Government Goal How Citizen Connect Addresses the Goal Citizens can reach the right resource, the first time. Government reduces the number of avoidable contacts, such as status checking. Goal: Reduce avoidable contacts by 50 percent. Ease of Contact More phone interactions shift to electronic channels. Goal: Reduce agent calls by 50 percent. Constituents change their preferred method of initiating simple service requests from the phone to the web, reducing contact center costs. Agents have access to Knowledge-Management and CRM applications to fulfill service requests First-Call Resolution from citizens. Goal: Fulfill 80 percent of service requests during the first contact. A single phone number or web portal can be used for service requests that involve multiple Coordinated Government government agencies. Examples include calls to report births, weddings, changes of residence, Services and deaths. Inclusion People who are sight-impaired or deaf can obtain services by phone or electronic channels. Constituents generally prefer human contact unless they have selected a self-service option. Human Contact with Therefore, Interactive Voice Response (IVR) is used only for self-service transactions or when Government volumes are unexpectedly high. Citizens can use the web portal to access their information and check request status without Self-Service assistance, reducing the costs of handling simple inquiries. The solution complies with all privacy regulations, even as it enables information-sharing Privacy between agencies. 6 © 2011 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Building Blocks The Citizen Connect architecture framework consists of four building cornerstones (Figure 2). Figure 2 Government Interaction Networks Need Four Sets of Capabilities Cornerstone 1: Knowledge and Process Management Challenge: Agency employees and contact center agents typically use multiple applications to resolve citizen inquiries, including content management systems, case management systems, knowledge management systems, databases, and web portals. The interface must

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