Public Sector Shared Services Move Out of the "Back-Office": The Role of Public Policy and Mission Criticality

Shared service providers typically host routine and administrative business processes as a way to standardize company practices and increase efficiency. In the public sector, however, its application to functions critical to an organization"s central mission is moving shared services out of the...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:ACM SIGMIS Database: the DATABASE for Advances in Information Systems 2017-08, Vol.48 (3), p.83-109
Main Authors: Tomasino, Arthur P., Fedorowicz, Jane, Williams, Christine B.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Centralization
Information management
Information technology
Organizations
Public policy
Public safety
Public sector
Standardization
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Summary:Shared service providers typically host routine and administrative business processes as a way to standardize company practices and increase efficiency. In the public sector, however, its application to functions critical to an organization"s central mission is moving shared services out of the "back-office." This research employs and extends Bergeron"s (2003) framework to case analysis of two public safety networks within the United States, and prompts the addition of two new characteristics for public sector shared services, Public Policy and Type of Service. In this sector, we find that legislative controls, i.e. policy, manage information and communications technology (ICT) investment to meet efficiency and especially effectiveness goals, while mission criticality serves to trump cost considerations. Recommendations resulting from this research should lead to improvements in the cost and performance of public-sector shared services and their role in ICT-supported, mission-critical, shared services.
ISSN:0095-0033
1532-0936
1532-0936
DOI:10.1145/3130515.3130521