GUEST COLUMN.

Government can spend millions of dollars by modernizing its workforce systems and still retain many of the same workforce problems it was trying to solve.

Typically, when a modernization initiative begins, a project team is assembled, requirements are gathered, existing processes are documented, funding is identified and technology options are explored. That all sounds like responsible project planning. But the question government organizations don't ask frequently enough is this:  Are we designing how work should happen in the future or documenting how it happens today?

Organizations can spend enormous amounts of money automating the past. Before carrying an existing workforce process into a new system, organizations should understand why it exists. Think of it as institutional archaeology. Processes may exist because of a decision made 20 years ago, because an old system couldn't do something, or because one department developed a workaround that eventually became standard practice.

But dig beneath the process. Is it required by law, part of a labor agreement, designed to protect employees or ensure public accountability? Does it support a legitimate operational requirement or is it an artifact of a system, organizational structure or decision that no longer exists?

Government is complex for legitimate reasons. Public agencies operate within civil service systems, collective bargaining agreements, statutory requirements, budget constraints, public accountability expectations and service obligations that don't disappear because a new technology platform is being implemented.

A city may employ office workers, police officers, firefighters, utility crews, transit operators and emergency dispatch personnel all operating under different rules and, often, different labor agreements. A state may have hundreds of classifications, multiple funding sources and workforce practices that have evolved over decades.

Of course, complexity is sometimes necessary. But inherited complexity and necessary complexity are not the same thing. Modernization should create an opportunity to distinguish between them.

This is where traditional definitions of project success can become problematic. A system can be implemented on time and within budget. It can meet the requirements documented in the RFP, pass user acceptance testing and technically perform exactly as promised. And it can still fail to meaningfully improve how the organization manages its workforce.

When workforce questions are asked too late, organizations can find themselves automating outdated processes instead of eliminating them, configuring expensive technology around rules no one has challenged in years, or recreating manual workarounds inside a brand-new platform.

They may design jobs around yesterday's workforce while simultaneously struggling to recruit tomorrow’s. And perhaps most frustratingly, employees may continue creating workarounds because the new system doesn't reflect how the work happens, only to be blamed later for failing to adopt the new process.

This is why workforce strategy cannot begin and end with HR. Finance understands the fiscal model. Operations understand how services get delivered. Procurement understands the acquisition environment. IT understands the technology landscape. Labor relations understands contractual obligations. HR understands workforce policy, talent, classification, employee experience and the implications of workforce decisions across the organization.

And perhaps most importantly, the people doing the work understand where policy, process and technology collide in ways that aren't always visible from an organizational chart or process map.

Modernization requires those perspectives to intersect before decisions become difficult to reverse. Because decisions about scheduling, staffing, classifications, overtime, skills, organizational structures, data and automation aren't simply HR decisions. They determine whether an organization has the human capacity to deliver public services.

Organizations can build this kind of workforce discovery into the earliest stages of modernization: before an RFP is drafted, during cross-functional discovery sessions, while the business case is being developed, and as leaders determine what outcomes the project is expected to produce.

And those conversations should begin with different questions.

·        What workforce challenges are we trying to solve?

·        Which of our current processes are legally or contractually required and which have simply become institutional habits?

·        Where are employees compensating for broken processes with spreadsheets, emails, manual reconciliation or other workarounds?

·        What skills will our organization need five or ten years from now?

·        Where could automation change the work itself rather than simply making an existing process faster?

·        What information do leaders need to make better decisions about staffing, overtime, vacancies, skills and delivery service?

These questions shouldn't belong to one department. The answer won't always be that something needs to change. Some processes have survived for decades because they work. Some complexity exists because public accountability demands it. Some rules protect employees, taxpayers and essential public services. Those things should be preserved. But they should be preserved intentionally not simply inherited.

Technology matters. So do efficient procurement, thoughtful implementation and strong change management. But none of those things, by themselves, constitute modernization.

True modernization requires organizations to examine the assumptions underneath the technology. It requires leaders to separate what government must do from what government has simply become accustomed to doing. And it requires workforce strategy to be part of the conversation before the solution, the requirements and sometimes even the project itself have already been defined.

The greatest risk isn't necessarily choosing the wrong technology. It may be successfully implementing exactly what you asked for only to discover that what you asked for was a better way to preserve the past.

The contents of this Guest Column are those of the author, and not necessarily Barrett and Greene, Inc

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