DIGITAL DANES

Leading the world in e-readiness

In the Economist’s latest ranking of the digital maturity of countries, Denmark has reclaimed pole position from the USA, not least because Danes actually use public sector e-services

By Morten Andersen

After a temporary dive to the fifth position in 2008, Denmark is back as the world’s most e-ready country according to the 2009 “E-readiness rankings” from the Economist Intelligence Unit. The resurgence is especially due to a change in the analysis criteria, so that not only the technological stage of the countries is assessed, but also how much the digital services are actually being used. And here Denmark gains high scores.

“It has become almost a trivial thing to Danes that you can key in information on your personal finances to the tax authorities, but seen in an international context, it is actually unique,” comments Peter Lorentz Nielsen, partner in Devoteam Consulting – the Danish department of Devoteam Group – a consultancy firm in IT governance.

Big Brother in reverse
Another Danish example Peter Lorentz Nielsen mentions is a new register of the consumption of prescription medication:

“The register was established so that authorities could administer a new scheme for publicly reimbursed medicines, but it has provided many derivative benefits.

For example many elderly citizens were previously overmedicated because several different doctors prescribed medicine to them. This is being discovered now.”

Both the filing of tax information and medicine consumption are examples of systems containing confidential personal data.

“These systems are well protected against unauthorised use. I would even call them examples of “Big Brother in reverse”, because citizens can see not only the information about themselves, but also which public sector authorities have been in reading the information,” says Peter Lorentz Nielsen.

E-ready citizens
Danish public sector systems are also coordinated via the citizen’s civil registration number. For example, when a citizen reports a move to a new address in one system, it will be automatically updated in all the other public sector systems.

“This is again something that Danes think of as trivial, but it is in fact a major problem in many other countries,” says Peter Lorentz Nielsen, adding that Denmark’s elevated position in the ranking also has a very down-to-earth reason:

“Denmark’s modest size makes things a lot easier compared to for example Germany, which is a large country with strong traditions for independent solutions in the federal states. But this does not change the fact that when you look at it from the citizen’s point of view, Denmark is far ahead. This is largely because the citizens of Denmark are very e-ready – that has been confirmed through many surveys. In addition, Danish authorities are good at supplying services that go across ministries, regions and municipalities.”

Peter Lorentz Nielsen, partner in Devoteam Consulting, a consultancy firm in IT governance, characterises part of the digitalisation of Danish society as “Big Brother in reverse” because citizens can see not only information about themselves, but also which public sector authorities have been in reading the information.

You still need to attend the wedding ceremony

The vast majority of citizen contact with Gentofte municipality in Greater Copenhagen can today be handled digitally. For example, 70 percent of parents enrol their children in schools via the municipality’s website, and 40 percent of the elderly sign up for excursions and events digitally

By Morten Andersen

A couple who want to be married at Gentofte Town Hall still need to attend personally and shake hands with the mayor. But the couple can deal with the preparatory paperwork at home from their computer. Altogether, there are very few municipal matters requiring citizens to turn up in person.

Gentofte is a wealthy municipality of approximately 70,000 citizens in the northern part of Greater Copenhagen. 25 percent of families in Gentofte use one or more of the municipality’s digital services. In comparison, the figure for the whole of Denmark – which is a pioneering country in digitalisation of the public sector – is about 5 percent.

“We are very satisfied that one in four families uses our digital services. It is when you scale up from a limited group of users to a large group that you really start to gain from it,” says financial director Jens Peter Friis. “Digitalisation contains no efficiency improvement in itself. Only when many citizens use the solutions, do the financial benefits begin.”

Each year, the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation awards the prize “Best on the net” to the country’s best website in public e-administration. Gentofte municipality won the prize last time around, notably because of its online service called “Genvej”(Danish for “short cut”) which gives citizens access to digital self-service. Genvej was also given the European eGovernment Award 2009 in the category for services targeted at citizens.

Personal access for citizens
When the municipality started the project in 2005, there were already around 80 different digital services for its citizens. Some were placed on school websites, others on the town hall’s website or with the municipality’s IT supplier.

“The common feature was that very few people used them. Our strategy was to bring the services together on a shared platform, while at the same time making Genvej personal. It means that when you log on, the system knows which services you are interested in. It becomes easy for you to find the relevant things,” explains Jens Peter Friis.

The most popular service is the contact between schools/day care centres, parents and the municipal administration. For example 70 percent of parents enrol their children in school digitally, a service the municipality itself has been strongly involved in developing.

“Our philosophy is to concentrate our actions on the services citizens use in everyday life, for example parents’ contact with schools and day care centres. On the other hand it is not so often that a citizen gets married or needs a new passport. Here we will also offer digital services, but instead of developing them ourselves, we will either team up with other municipalities – so that development costs an be shared – or take a look around – perhaps the state or others have developed a service solution that can be used,” explains Jens Peter Friis.

Photo: Scanpix

Web-savvy elderly
Although families with children are the largest group of consumers of digital services, the financial director is proud of the fact that elderly citizens also make active use of digital services.

“We can see that 40 per cent of our elderly citizens use the internet when they sign up for excursions, events for the elderly or similar offers,” says Jens Peter Friis, who at the same time concedes that the municipality is privileged regarding its citizens.

“The general competence of our citizens is clearly higher than the national average, and they also have a high degree of maturity concerning IT. The vast majority of them have acquired digital skills through their working lives. And for those who have not, we offer training, which typically comprises teaching sessions at the local library.”

“It is unlikely that every municipality would have achieved such a high proportion of users so quickly. In my view the maturity of our citizens is a decisive factor for succeeding with digitalisation. Other municipalities should not necessarily copy what we have done. Perhaps they should use a bit more effort to ensure that readiness is present. It is better to have fewer services that many use, than many services which few use.”

“Someone has to take the lead” Gentofte municipality is not resting on its digital laurels. It plans to introduce several innovative features this year.

For a start, all building projects will be available digitally so homeowners can see the modifications which have been made to a property over the years without needing to go to the town hall.

In addition Gentofte municipality is discontinuing one of the nuisances which new parents traditionally have had – the uncertainty of when their child can get a place in a day nursery, and in which institution.

“We are simply closing down our place assignment and instead are making the places available on the net. As soon as the newborn child has been given its civil registration number, the parents can book a place. Naturally we cannot guarantee there will always be a place at the requested institution at the requested time, but parents can immediately see what the alternatives are, so they can make a choice and start to plan their daily lives accordingly,” explains Jens Peter Friis.

On the question of whether it has been a major expense for the municipality to become digital, the financial director answers:

“We gained a sound agreement with our IT supplier because we contributed our knowledge of citizens’ needs and wishes. In return the supplier gained a product which can be sold to other municipalities. So it has actually been inexpensive for us. But apart from that, I don’t think that we had any choice.

We could see that our citizens simply expected us to become digital. Someone has to take the lead.”

Digital Danes

Reports from the Economist Intelligence Unit and the World Economic Forum indicate that Denmark is among the world leaders in e-readiness. Here are a few examples to illustrate how Danes make the most of the internet

By Daniel Svarts Andreassen

Using the internet during exams
Access to the internet during the upper secondary school leaving examination sounds like a dream to many and an obvious opportunity for cheating. Nonetheless, this is what a number of Danish upper secondary schools, in collaboration with the Ministry of Education, are introducing on a test basis in Danish, maths and social studies exams in summer 2010 as part of a comprehensive plan to make secondary school students more confident and critical in their use of the internet.

To avoid cheating, students submit their exam papers electronically so that teachers can check that there is no direct copying of information, and random checks will be carried out during the exams.

Danes love facebook
Denmark has proportionally more Face-book users than any other country: 2.2 million of the total population of 5.5 million are on Facebook.

Almost 100 percent of 14 to 20 year olds and 15 percent of 60 to 64 year olds have a Facebook profile. The average age of Danish Facebook users is 29.2 years, the highest average age in the Nordic region. Divided between the sexes, there is a small majority of men.

Adaptive national electronic tests
Denmark has led the way in introducing national adaptive electronic tests in state schools, where the skills of state school pupils are tested individually via the internet.

A programme which can run on the four main browsers – Explorer, Mozilla, Firefox and Safari – puts questions to the pupil. If a question is answered correctly, the subsequent questions are more difficult. Conversely, if a question is answered incorrectly, the subsequent questions are easier. Depending on their class year, pupils are tested in Danish, English, maths, biology, geography, physics and chemistry.

The tests are not a means of comparing student performance, but a tool that provides schools with a unique opportunity to assess what a pupil is gaining from the teaching.

The national tests are carried out simultaneously across the entire country, from the second class year up to and including the eighth class year. The electronic platform for the national tests has been developed by Danish consulting engineers COWI .

Naming children
New parents always have plenty to do, but at least they now have one less thing to worry about. The trip to the parish office can be replaced by a trip on the internet, because the Danish state has made it possible to name your child on the internet when reporting a birth.

In addition to naming a newborn child, you can also change your surname on the website if for example you marry or divorce.

P, Ernie & Enzo by Kit Kjølhede Laursen http://www.kit-k.com

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