Digital transformation success in the public sector: A systematic literature review of cases,processes,and success factors

Abstract

This study conducts a systematic literature review on several aspects regarding the success of initiatives of digital transformation in the public sector (DTPS), focusing on case studies, processes, and success factors of the DTPS projects. The research was carried out using several scientific databases and indexers (such as ACM Digital Library, IEEE Xplore, and ISI Web of Science). The literature review process enabled the identification of a total of 38 case studies, four processes, and 51 success factors, all of which are presented and discussed, contributing both to theory and practice, to minimizing risks and improving the success of DTPS projects. The review process also enabled the identification of new research avenues.

Keywords

Digital transformation public sector e-Gov e-Government digital government smart government case study process success factor

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1. Introduction

Digital transformation emerges as a process of evolution to a new digital reality by taking advantage of opportunities stemming from technological advances to automate processes, achieve productivity gains and increase efficiency (Bleicher & Stanley, 2017; Costa, 2020). In this sense, Digital Transformation in the Public Sector (DTPS) should follow a holistic approach, as it is an opportunity to review key government processes and services, move forward and go beyond traditional digitalization efforts by focusing, among others, on meeting citizens’ needs, new ways of providing services, and expanding user bases (Mergel et al., 2019).

Digital transformation is also crucial for thoroughly modernize public administration (Schedler et al., 2019). DTPS “evolves along a continuum of transition from analog to digital, to a full-stack review of policies, current processes, and user needs, and results in a complete revision of the existing and the creation of new digital services” (Mergel et al., 2019). However, as Clarke (2020) pointed out, despite all this plethora of possibilities, digital service failures abound, and citizens’ trust in government continues to wane. Despite the well-founded efforts towards DTPS, public organizations struggle to realize their full potential (Hackney & McBride, 1995). One of the reasons for this is that the public sector IT departments – and consequently public organizations – are not always properly prepared to face this challenge (Torres et al., 2005).

Therefore, the public management community cannot ignore or neglect digital transformation, related best practices, and contemporary governance roles (Clarke, 2020; Renteria et al., 2019). By driving a compelling response, a truly holistic DTPS approach can play a critical role in reducing failures and increasing the success of digital transformation initiatives, thus resulting in modulating citizens’ trust (Mahmood, 2016; Morgeson III et al., 2011; Tolbert & Mossberger, 2006).

The success of digital transformation initiatives in the public sector rests fundamentally on the adoption of structured processes that thoroughly consider the factors that influence the results. It is also important to look at successful cases of digital transformation so that they can be used as a benchmark – “learning from the best practice in e-governments will minimize the implementation risks and time” (Al-Shuaili et al., 2019). Although several studies in the current literature report success cases, processes applied, and success factors, to the best of our knowledge, no studies have yet compiled these investigations in a way that facilitates easy consultation of the results obtained. This article seeks to fill this gap.

Our study provides a systematic literature review on DTPS initiatives by addressing the success of projects and focusing on case studies and processes applied. It seeks to (1) catalog the case studies of digital transformation projects in the public sector and their main results; (2) to classify and detail the work processes reported in related studies; (3) to list the factors that can impact success in the public sector in the form of a unified framework of success factors for digital transformation projects in the public sector. This threefold set of goals can serve as a guide for future DTPS initiatives, helping to reduce inherent risks, prevent failures, and improve public trust in the success of DTPS initiatives.

The findings are valuable for public organizations as they attempt to realize the potential of their digital transformation initiatives. Our study provides both a theoretical and a practical contribution. The theoretical contribution stems from the compilation of digital transformation processes in the public sector and the proposal for a unified framework of success factors for digital transformation projects in the public sector. Practitioners can find in this article several alternative processes that can be applied to their specific contexts and a framework of success factors to take into consideration. Furthermore, the identified cases can be used as a benchmark.

In the ensuing Section 2 we present the background regarding digital transformation in general and digital transformation in the specific context of public sector organizations. Section 3 presents the research method, Section 4 details the results, and Section 5 discusses these results. The paper ends with conclusions, limitations, and suggestions for further work.

2. Background

Digital Transformation (DT) is defined as “the use of new digital technologies (social media, mobile, analytics or embedded devices) to enable major business improvements” (Fitzgerald et al., 2014). According to the European Commission, DT and the advancement of technologies are inextricably linked and “are giving rise to disruptive business models that profoundly impact industries, businesses, and citizens” (Probst et al., 2017).

DT is not only about technology. It also involves strategy, leadership, and the effort to change the mindset of teams, organizational culture, and processes before selecting a specific technology and how to implement it (Rogers, 2016; Tabrizi et al., 2019). In order to consolidate concepts, given the multiple extant definitions, DT can be regarded as “an evolutionary process that leverages digital capabilities and technologies to enable business models, operational processes and customer experiences to create value” (Morakanyane et al., 2017).

Digital transformation is not only driving innovation in the business sector, but also seems to be influencing developments in the public sector (Kokkinakos et al., 2016). Real-world digital transformation experiences are changing citizens’ expectations of governments’ ability to deliver high-value, real-time digital services (Mergel et al., 2019). Clarke (2020) and Jonathan (2019) corroborate this type of pressure on governments and argue that it stems from demands both from the politicians themselves and the citizens. Hence, to deal with this extended scenario, particularly in the public sector, DT must foster new ways of working with stakeholders, build new service delivery structures, and create new stakeholder relationships (Mergel et al., 2019).

In line with this, Clarke (2020) argues that government digital transformation comes with accountability challenges, since digitalization is increasingly not a mere add-on to a government’s daily work, but rather underpins all of its operations, emerging both as the front and back end of government operations.

3. Method

This section presents the literature review methodological approach. This systematic review aims to catalog DTPS case studies and reported processes, focusing particularly on the factors that can impact the success of digital transformation projects in the public sector.

Figure 1.

Systematic literature review process.

Figure 1 shows the overall process and respective steps, which are described next.

3.1 Planning

The main research question is:

•
MQ. What factors can impact the success of digital transformation initiatives in the public sector?

For complete coverage, we also address DTPS case studies and DTPS processes, since they represent important lessons learned and good practices that are critical for achieving success. The complementary questions are:
•
CQ1. What are the case studies and respective lessons learned from digital transformation projects in the public sector?
•
CQ2. What processes are followed in digital transformation projects in the public sector?

The articles were gathered from the three databases that cover the leading journals and conferences (Carrizo & Rojas, 2018; dos Santos et al., 2021; M Al-Eidan et al., 2020), aiming to bring together a broad volume of quality works related to the research: ACM Digital Library (dl.acm.org), IEEE Xplore (ieeexplore.ieee.org), and ISI Web of Science (isiwebofknowledge.com).

The databases were consulted from January 1, 2015 to March 31, 2020. This five-year period accounts for much of the emphasis on DTPS and allows avoiding bias from the first wave of the Sars-Covid-2 pandemic. The search expressions were (“digital transformation framework” or “digital transformation model” or “digital transformation” or “digitization” or “digitalization”) AND (“public sector” or “public administration” or “public service” or “government” or “public sphere” or “public organization”). The queries applied to each database are described in Appendix A.

The inclusion criteria were the following: IC1 – Academic or industry study; IC2 – Describe successful cases of DTPS projects; IC3 – Describe processes that guided DTPS initiatives; IC4 – Present success factors for DTPS projects; IC5 – Quantitative or qualitative study; IC6 – Written in English; and IC7 – Published from 2015 onwards. In turn, the exclusion criteria were the following: EC1 – Inaccessibility (not entirely accessible online or totally inaccessible); EC2 – Repeated article; EC3 – Not written in English; EC4 – Published as a short paper or a poster; EC5 – Lacking an abstract; EC6 – Not focused on DTPS; EC7 – Preface, editorial, article summary, book chapter, book, interview, workshop, short paper, panel, or poster; and EC8 – Present a process without its application description. An article should match at least one inclusion criterion and none exclusion criterion to be part of our selection.
3.2 Execution

After applying the search strings on the databases, a total of 3,804 articles were obtained, distributed among ACM Digital Library (1,600), IEEE Xplore (1,563), and ISI Web of Science (641). After removing the duplicates, with Mendeley software’s support for cataloging the resulting articles’ list, the total was 3,772 unique articles (398 in 2015, 702 in 2016, 714 in 2017, 819 in 2018, 1,055 in 2019, and 84 in 2020). Then, each researcher performed a selection based on reading the title and the abstract, using the Rayyan software, with the blind option activated. This analysis yielded 85 articles.

The full versions of these 85 articles were subsequently retrieved, and the Zotero software was used for storing the articles to be read. During this step, 2 of 85 papers proved to be inaccessible and were excluded.

In order to organize the systematic review and the resulting analysis, a spreadsheet was created to classify the 83 retrieved articles in terms of case study description, critical success factors, and processes implemented in the initiative. In addition, the country of the publication and the scope of evaluation (government level and government branch) were indicated for each article (when available). Finally, abstract, limitations, and future work were organized for each article. In the end, each article received a summary. As a result, in addition to the features described here, every article under study was submitted to the reviewers’ decision to be included or not. And finally, the inclusion and exclusion criteria were applied. In the end, a total of 56 papers remained, distributed as shown in Table 1.

Table 1
Analyzed articles

Base	2016	2017	2018	2019	2020	Total
ACM	3	8	9	9	0	29
IEEE	1	5	3	4	0	13
ISI	2	0	0	10	1	14
TOTAL						56

3.3 Quality assessment

The objective of the quality assessment phase was to obtain relevant information related to the research questions. The articles were classified by type (case study, process, or success factor) to try to answer the questions by gathering more information about them, considering the methodological aspects and their contribution to the research questions (Kitchenham & Charters, 2007). For this, we applied a checklist of quality criteria according to the following items: QC1 – Does the paper present a case study on DTPS projects?; QC2 – Does the paper present a process applied to DTPS projects?; QC3 – Does the paper present success factors for DTPS projects?; QC4 – Does the paper mention its research limitations?; QC5 – Does the paper indicate opportunities for further research?

According to Petticrew and Roberts (2008), checklists applied in a systematic review “provide one means of ensuring that included studies contain sufficient information about the sample, the question, the data analysis”. To create a relevancy ranking, each paper received one point whenever it met one of the five criteria. If the paper covers a case study, process, or success factor, it is scored according to each of these categories. We also considered the key limitations to contextualize the research findings, to interpret the validity of the scientific work, and assign a level of credibility to the conclusions (Ioannidis, 2007); therefore, one point was assigned whenever this aspect was present. An additional point was assigned if the paper under analysis described future studies, since this aspect is essential for complementing or continuing the published studies.

Appendix B lists all of the 56 studies according to their ranking. Noteworthy are the studies from Carrasqueiro et al. (2018); Lappi et al. (2019); Marzooqi et al. (2017); and Sundberg (2018), since they all matched four criteria.

4. Results

This section presents the results organized by case studies, processes, and success factors regarding DTPS projects.

4.1 Case studies

A total of 38 case studies were identified in the literature and were subsequently analyzed and classified according to country of publication, governmental level of the initiative (Central, Regional, and/or Local), and governmental branch (Executive, Legislative, and/or Judiciary). Table 2 presents the 38 case studies involving DTPS projects and a summary of the main results of each case study.

Table 2
Case studies

Reference	Government level	Governmentbranch	Countryanalyzed	Main results
(Sangolt & Keitsch, 2016)	Central/regional/local	Executive	Norway	It explores how service design can be utilized in the DT of government services by highlighting the value of horizontal and vertical integration and making changes through government agencies within a collaborative e-Gov.
(Choi et al., 2016)	Central	Executive	South Korea	It highlights three stages in the stabilization process: 1) adoption – the process was driven by the availability of new technology without a corresponding revision of the legal system; 2) destabilization – in response to conflicts between technology and the legal system, stakeholder and government agencies joined the structuring process; 3) stabilization – a consensus was reached on the spirit of the technology and legal system.
(Nielsen, 2016)	Central	Executive	Faroe Islands	It points out that even microstates and government dependencies with limited resources can use Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) to successfully modernize public administration; it sheds light on key lessons related to political/financial commitment, and participatory e-Gov strategy; discusses ICT as enabling tool to trade and legal simplification.
(Madsen & Kraemmergaard, 2016)	Central	Executive	Denmark	It highlights how public officials collaborated to create a multichannel communication strategy for mandatory online self-service application, resulting into increased use of the application and a substantial reduction of phone calls.
(Singh et al., 2017)	Central/regional	Executive	India	The results and findings are organized by users, technology, policy, institution, and economic aspects. It highlights the relevance of more than thirty constructs regarding the outcomes of the projects.
(Nerurkar & Das, 2017a)	Central/ Regional	Executive	India	It proposes agile project management for large-scale e-Gov projects and to timely utilize the benefits of the project for the citizens.
(Nerurkar & Das, 2017b)	Central/ Regional	Executive	India	It emphasizes the need for agile project management via a detailed analysis of a large-scale e-Gov project.
(Marzooqi et al., 2017)	Local	Executive	United Arab Emirates	It argues that smart governments can promote acceptance by citizens by adopting a citizen-centric approach.
(Tchao et al., 2017)	Central	Executive	Ghana	It points out that the rollout of e-Gov services has facilitated transparent governance and citizen participation, in addition to reducing the cost of operations; despite these benefits, infrastructure, financial, and political constraints still hamper a nationwide rollout of e-Gov services.
(Rammea & Grobbelaar, 2017)	Central	Executive	Lesotho	It highlights e-Gov implementation at the early transactional stage of evaluation; it concludes that e-Gov is primarily focused on the efficiency of processes and lacks a citizen-centric approach.
(Cahlikova, 2017)	Central	Executive	Switzerland	It identifies the main factors impacting e-approach, such as economic rationale for introducing e-reforms, the critical role of actors’ behaviors and attitudes, and the impossibility of digitalizing public administrations in a unified and coherent fashion due to extensive autonomy in all levels of government.

Table 2, continued
Reference	Government level	Governmentbranch	Countryanalyzed	Main results
(Scupola, 2018)	Central	Executive	Denmark	It shows how goals were achieved and its leading role in Europe (DESI Index)/world regarding digitalization initiatives.
(Carrasqueiro et al., 2018)	Central Regional	Executive	Portugal	It shows that whole-of-government services can support policy integration and boost government agencies to work together towards revisiting processes and workflows to simplify and harmonize them, resulting in a coherent and shared response to citizens’ needs.
(Lindgren & van Veenstra, 2018)	Central/ Regional	Executive	Sweden	It highlights that DT can be a multidimensional process taking place at multiple (cross) levels of organization; it shows that public e-service development should consider changing and redesigning IT, processes, organization layers, and a potential redesign of the institutional layer.
(Rakotonirina & Raoelson, 2018)	Central	Executive	Madagascar	It highlights that despite the e-Gov reform, numerous obstacles impede the effective provision of high-quality public services.
(Sundberg, 2018)	Central	Executive	Sweden	The findings revealed four interoperability enablers (open-source software, legal interpretations, tailored resource allocation, and an agency dedicated to infrastructure) to increase efficiency and effectiveness regarding privacy, jurisdiction and security autonomy of government agencies.
(Osifo, 2018)	Central/regional/local	Executive	Finland	It highlights that the formulation and implementation of public policies and services have been strongly affected by the growth and use of technological tools; it reveals that digital government via the framework of e-Gov has an excellent strategic analysis, action plans, and backups.
(Paletti, 2018)	Local	Executive	UK	It presents a theoretical framework grounded in ICT-mediated co-production; it describes its application in all organizational dimensions, and ICT/strategy alignment.
(Avila-Maravilla & Luna-Reyes, 2018)	Regional	Executive	Mexico	It reveals that institutional arrangements impact the success or failure of digital government projects; it presents a bidirectional effect via the “enacting electronic government success model.”
(Prakash & Gunalan, 2019)	Central/ Regional	Executive	India	It demonstrates that a structured framework can successfully monitor, evaluate, and accelerate a DT process.
(Ayquipa et al., 2019)	Regional	Executive	Peru	It highlights the barriers that obstruct the implementation of e-Gov services, requiring an effort at numerous organizational levels, with positive results.
(Kompella, 2019)	Central/regional/local	Executive	India	It uses ICT to automate routines, reduce turnaround times, increase output, and integrate departments.
(Filgueiras et al., 2019)	Central	Executive	Brazil	It shows that DT does not necessarily result in unified government platforms; the predictors for digitalizing public services vary across institutional preferences; despite central orientation, digitalization has occurred in various ways within the federal government.
(Avramchikova et al., 2019)	Local	Executive	Russia	It points to the main fields of the DT of monotowns (infrastructure, urban environment, safe town, budget, and open municipality); it highlights that a digital municipality can be the combined result of some institutions of the public self-government, non-profit social nets, and systems electronically providing services.

Table 2, continued
Reference	Government level	Governmentbranch	Countryanalyzed	Main results
(Shin & Rakhmatullayev, 2019)	Central	Executive	Uzbekistan	It highlights the aim to achieve governance and optimization by creating a single center, improving infrastructure, and introducing interactive public services by optimizing processes and the flow of open and shared data.
(Ivanova et al., 2019)	Central	Executive	Russia	It argues that despite accumulated positive experience in e-Gov implementation, the federation needs to move towards sharing infrastructure with the cloud, to improve the quality, security, and financial savings.
(Marino & Pariso, 2019)	Local	Executive	Italy	It highlights that bureaucracy and Italian culture are major impediments in the realization of e-Gov implementation and related economic development; it proposes a different management approach related to the stage, functionality, and effectiveness of bureaucracy.
(Defriani & Resmi, 2019)	Regional	Executive	Indonesia	It proposes an implementation roadmap by planning e-government architecture in the G2B (Government to Business) and G2G (Government to Government), to create a complete e-Gov framework.
(Lessa & Tsegaye, 2019)	Central	Judiciary	Ethiopia	It presents user service evaluation as a public value perspective of e-Gov in the Supreme Court. Most respondents do not recognize that quality, effectiveness, and public value have been achieved.
(Pappel et al., 2019)	Local	Executive	Estonia	It argues that paperless management can enable e-services for fully digitalized interaction between citizens and governments to facilitate improved service provision; it uses a systematic implementation methodology (interoperability, continuous improvement of processes, and continuous feedback).
(Meyerhoff Nielsen, 2019)	Central/regional/local	Executive	Denmark	It points out three enablers (governance, intergovernmental cooperation, and benefits realization), describing unique features that align objectives and create a sense of joint ownership across all levels of government.
(Reascos et al., 2019)	Local	Executive	Ecuador	It presents findings on an ERP IT application’s implantation process carried out in a medium-size municipality; the study identifies stages, areas of concern, and the process’ most relevant activities.
(Lappi et al., 2019)	Central	Executive	Finland	It describes how diverse governance practices and processes focused on project portfolio management are applied vertically across different organizational levels to link ICT projects with the national strategy.
(McBride, 2019)	Central	Executive	Faroe Islands	It identifies critical contextual factors that influenced the process and beliefs and have affected the current digitalization; it presents findings that digitalization can provide other tangible benefits, such as a revitalized ICT sector, despite being cost-ineffective.
(Roy, 2019)	Central	Executive	Canada	It reveals structural and cultural inhibitors to innovation and public value creation across the inter-related domains of service, openness, and engagement, despite significant actions towards adopting a more user-centric design perspective and promoting open government.

Table 2, continued
Reference	Government level	Governmentbranch	Countryanalyzed	Main results
(Anand & Khemchandani, 2019)	Central	Executive	India	It argues that e-government is useful to reduce corruption and save time and money by working with reliability, transparency, and efficiency without breaking the concept of cost-effectiveness; it describes policies and initiatives to develop and deploy e-government projects.
(Lessa, 2019)	Central/regional	Executive and Judiciary	Ethiopia	It presents a framework for e-government success validated by a Court Case Management System; it points to the framework’s potential for understanding the success and sustainability of e-government initiatives.
(Ngonzi & Sewchurran, 2019)	Central	Executive	Tanzania	It uses e-government implementation to showcase the pragmatic weakness when using e-Gov Maturity Models as a roadmap; it highlights that functional user-stakeholders have weak participation in e-government implementation.

4.2 Processes

A total of four processes for digital transformation initiatives in the public sector were identified in the literature, and were analyzed regarding their origin (literature review or case study) and the structure they presented. Furthermore, following the typology proposed by Hatsu and Ngassam (2017), the type of process was also identified. Hatsu and Ngassam (2017) proposed a typification for e-Gov frameworks by considering: (1) e-Readiness and strategy-based, (2) Maturity stage-based, and (3) Project life cycle-centric. e-Readiness and strategy-based sets how to convert an e-Gov vision through objectives and principles into an implementation plan – how the implementation plan would be executed is out of the scope of this type of framework (Hatsu & Ngassam, 2017; Rabaiah & Vandijct, 2011). Maturity stage-based views e-Gov as a multistep/multistage process, emphasizing the development level of the e-Gov project (Concha et al., 2012; Hatsu & Ngassam, 2017; Klievink & Janssen, 2009). All four processes analyzed fit better in the typology project life cycle-centric, since they are concerned with DT implementation activities. Table 3 presents the articles that describe processes for DTPS projects.

Table 3
Processes articles

Reference	Source	Structure	Type
(Hatsu & Ngassam, 2017)	Literature review	Layers and Phases	Project life cycle-centric
Details:Pre-initiation [Governance; Policy; Stakeholder; Vision; ICT landscape; Outreach; Change Management; Successful project].Monitoring and Evaluation [Definition; Planning; Execution; Deployment; Closure].Impact Assessment [Goals and expectations; Baseline; Data gathering; Analysis; Report; Recommendation; Best practices].
(Defriani & Resmi, 2019)	Literature review	Phases and Steps	Project life cycle-centric
Details:Organize and Plan: 1. Identify and Validate [Engage Sponsor and Assess Stakeholder Needs; Analyze and Validate Needs; Formulate Cases to Address the Needs; Identify and Engage governance]. 2. Research and Leverage [Identify Organizations and Service Provider to Engage; Analyze Opportunities to Leverage; Determine Whether to Leverage]. 3. Define and Plan [Formalize Collaborative Planning Teams and Launch Planning; Refine the Vision or Performance and Outcome; Analyze the Current State, Determine Adjustments, and Plan the Target; Formulate the Integrated Plan and Roadmap; Initiate Execution Governance]. Implement and Measure: 4. Invest and Execute [Define Funding Strategy and Make Decision; Obtain Resources and Validate Plan; Execute the Plan]. 5. Perform and Measure [Operate with the New Capabilities; Measure Performance Against Metrics; Analyze and Provide feedback].
(Reascos et al., 2019)	Case study	Phases and Stages	Project life cycle-centric
Details:Pre-implantation [Define needs and process; contracting services].Implantation [Initiating; Planning; Executing; Monitoring and Controlling; Closure].Post-implantation [Stabilization; Support; Update].Transversal areas [Leadership; Communication; Change Management; Project Management].
(Carrasqueiro et al., 2018)	Case study	Phases	Project life cycle-centric
Details:Conceptualization; Kick-off and preparation; Development of the solution; Piloting; Rollout; Mandatory; Maintain and Support (ongoing).

4.3 Success factors

The success factors for digital transformation initiatives in the public sector were collected, consolidated, and systematized from the works analyzed. Given the diversity and number of factors, a categorization by dimensions was adopted to facilitate a better organization.

Ivančić et al. (2019) studied ways to group and categorize success factors based on the analysis of DT cases in different activity segments and concluded that, in addition to the adoption of technology, other factors are relevant for successful DT. This finding is also aligned with the work by the European Commission (Barcevičius et al., 2019; Williams & Valayer, 2018). The work conducted by Ivančić et al. (2019) lists seven dimensions (strategy, people, organization, customers, ecosystem, technology, and innovation) that, in their view, are the basis for digital transformation.

To categorize the critical success factors for DTPS projects, our work adopts the dimensions proposed by Ivančić et al. (2019), albeit with minor adaptations (we replaced customer with citizen, and created the Legal/Normative dimension). This type of organization is in line with arguments that state that DT goes beyond technology and also covers strategy, organization, teams, and more (Rogers, 2016; Tabrizi et al., 2019). The success factors gathered from the analyzed articles were subsequently consolidated and systematized and can be seen in Table 4, with respective references, clustered according to the following dimensions: strategy, people, organization, citizen, ecosystem, technology, innovation, and legal/normative. In each dimension, the success factors are ordered according to the number of references that have cited it (or a homonym).

Table 4
Success factors

Dimension	Success factors after consolidation and systematization	References
[1] Strategy	[1.1] Define an Information Technology (IT)/Information Systems (IS) Steering Committee	(Carrasqueiro et al., 2018; Enaw et al., 2016; Surya & Amalia, 2017; Kaya et al., 2020; Nielsen, 2019; Renteria et al., 2019; Schedler et al., 2019; Tambotoh et al., 2017)
	[1.2] Define an e-Gov Strategy, including strategy analysis, action plans, initiatives, goals, and Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)	(Carrasqueiro et al., 2018; Enaw et al., 2016; Surya & Amalia, 2017; Kaya et al., 2020; Nielsen, 2019; Putri & Sensuse, 2018; Renteria et al., 2019)
	[1.3] Adopt Portfolio, Program, and Project Management	(Carrasqueiro et al., 2018; Enaw et al., 2016; Surya & Amalia, 2017; Lappi et al., 2019; Nielsen, 2019; Tambotoh et al., 2017)
	[1.4] Develop IT leadership	(Carrasqueiro et al., 2018; Surya & Amalia, 2017; Pereira et al., 2017; Rakotonirina & Raoelson, 2018; Renteria et al., 2019; Tambotoh et al., 2017)
	[1.5] Top management support for IT	(Carrasqueiro et al., 2018; Enaw et al., 2016; Surya & Amalia, 2017; Kaya et al., 2020; Schedler et al., 2019; Tambotoh et al., 2017)
	[1.6] Ensure support and political stability across all three levels of government	(Kaya et al., 2020; Kim et al., 2016; Nielsen, 2019; Pereira et al., 2017; Schedler et al., 2019)
	[1.7] Sustain IT Investments	(Müller et al., 2018; Pereira et al., 2017; Tambotoh et al., 2017; Tchao et al., 2017)
	[1.8] Adopt Enterprise Architecture (EA)	(Agarwal et al., 2017; Carrasqueiro et al., 2018; Mayakul et al., 2019)
	[1.9] Develop an e-Mindset (“Digital First”) via a top-down approach	(Al-Shuaili et al., 2019; Kaya et al., 2020; Mergel et al., 2019)
	[1.10] Promote trust in e-Gov services	(Marzooqi et al., 2017; Pereira et al., 2017; Putri & Sensuse, 2018)
	[1.11] Establish a dedicated e-Government agency	(Sundberg, 2018)
[2] People	[2.1] Ensure team awareness and training	(Al-Shuaili et al., 2019; Carrasqueiro et al., 2018; Surya & Amalia, 2017; Kaya et al., 2020; Mergel et al., 2019; Rakotonirina & Raoelson, 2018; Rehouma & Hofmann, 2018; Schedler et al., 2019; Tchao et al., 2017)
	[2.2] Develop digital skills	(Carrasqueiro et al., 2018; Pereira et al., 2017; Rakotonirina & Raoelson, 2018; Tchao et al., 2017)
	[2.3] Develop a sense of belonging	(Surya & Amalia, 2017; Pereira et al., 2017)
	[2.4] Develop project management skills	(Pereira et al., 2017)
[3] Organization	[3.1] Ensure multilevel governance and management structures	(Carrasqueiro et al., 2018; Enaw et al., 2016; Kim et al., 2016; Nielsen, 2019; Renteria et al., 2019; Tchao et al., 2017)
	[3.2] Promote transparency and openness (via open data)	(Almukhlifi et al., 2019; Lindgren & van Veenstra, 2018; Marzooqi et al., 2017; Renteria et al., 2019; Tchao et al., 2017)
	[3.3] Ensure that the right positions are assigned to leaders and decision-makers	(Al-Shuaili et al., 2019; Putri & Sensuse, 2018; Rakotonirina & Raoelson, 2018; Renteria et al., 2019)
	[3.4] Adopt an agile approach	(Al-Shuaili et al., 2019; Lindgren & van Veenstra, 2018; Nerurkar & Das, 2017a, 2017b)
	[3.5] Promote information security, privacy, and data protection (GDPR compliance)	(Marzooqi et al., 2017; Pereira et al., 2017; Putri & Sensuse, 2018)
	[3.6] Be open to changes regarding processes (BPM) and organizational structures without fearing losing power; reduce internal conflicts, and promote integration	(Surya & Amalia, 2017; Marzooqi et al., 2017; Pereira et al., 2017)

Table 4, continued
Dimension	Success factors after consolidation and systematization	References
	[3.7] Involve all employees in implementing the e-Gov strategy	(Al-Shuaili et al., 2019; Rakotonirina & Raoelson, 2018)
	[3.8] Be open to changes in organizational culture (revolutionizing public service culture)	(Mergel et al., 2019; Pereira et al., 2017)
	[3.9] Promote customization of approaches	(Marzooqi et al., 2017; Pereira et al., 2017)
	[3.10] Guarantee high quality of information and e-Gov services	(Almukhlifi et al., 2019; Marzooqi et al., 2017)
	[3.11] Consider Digital Transformation as an ongoing challenge (a continuous process and not merely a project)	(Al-Shuaili et al., 2019; Mergel et al., 2019)
	[3.12] Manage the life cycle of public policy, including measurement and evaluation	(Pereira et al., 2017)
	[3.13] Adopt Lessons Learned	(Pereira et al., 2017)
	[3.14] Adopt Service Design approach	(Sangolt & Keitsch, 2016)
[4] Citizen	[4.1] Involve citizens in co-creation services, promote citizen awareness and participation via solid communication and be open to feedback on services	(Lindgren & van Veenstra, 2018; Marzooqi et al., 2017; Ngonzi & Sewchurran, 2019; Pereira et al., 2017; Putri & Sensuse, 2018; Sangolt & Keitsch, 2016; Schedler et al., 2019)
	[4.2] Promote acceptance and adoption of e-Gov services	(Almukhlifi et al., 2019; Kim et al., 2016; Marzooqi et al., 2017; Pereira et al., 2017; Schedler et al., 2019)
	[4.3] Consider citizens, employees, and governments responsible for e-Gov implementation	(Al-Shuaili et al., 2019; Marzooqi et al., 2017)
	[4.4] Provide services to help citizens (e-vote, e-payment)	(Marzooqi et al., 2017)
	[4.5] Be active with online government (24 $\times$ 7)	(Marzooqi et al., 2017)
[5] Ecosystem	[5.1] Promote cooperation and commitment between all stakeholders via institutional arrangements and by converging objectives (not only technical but also political)	(Avila-Maravilla & Luna-Reyes, 2018; Marzooqi et al., 2017; Mergel et al., 2019; Pereira et al., 2017; Rakotonirina & Raoelson, 2018)
	[5.2] Be concerned with reducing the digital divide	(Kaya et al., 2020; Kim et al., 2016; Pereira et al., 2017; Tchao et al., 2017)
	[5.3] Promote articulation between technical direction and solution providers	(Carrasqueiro et al., 2018)
[6] Technology	[6.1] Ensure necessary technological infrastructure with adequate costs	(Al-Shuaili et al., 2019; Carrasqueiro et al., 2018; Surya & Amalia, 2017; Marzooqi et al., 2017; Müller et al., 2018; Pereira et al., 2017; Putri & Sensuse, 2018; Renteria et al., 2019; Schedler et al., 2019; Sundberg, 2018; Tchao et al., 2017)
	[6.2] Promote usability and ease of use	(Almukhlifi et al., 2019; Surya & Amalia, 2017; Kaya et al., 2020; Marzooqi et al., 2017; Pereira et al., 2017)
	[6.3] Consider the latest technology (emerging digital technologies) and its application (taking into account IT Standards)	(Al-Shuaili et al., 2019; Surya & Amalia, 2017; Kim et al., 2016)
	[6.4] Develop portable/mobile/interoperable solutions (omnichannel)	(Carrillo et al., 2017; Kaya et al., 2020; Pereira et al., 2017)
	[6.5] Ensure the existence of mechanisms of identification and authentication	(Carrasqueiro et al., 2018)
	[6.6] Link all governmental units in one website (e-Gov portal)	(Marzooqi et al., 2017)
	[6.7] Provide personalized service and information	(Marzooqi et al., 2017)

Table 4, continued
Dimension	Success factors after consolidation and systematization	References
	[6.8] Provide tutorial and guidance on how to use e-Gov services	(Marzooqi et al., 2017)
	[6.9] Consider the use of Open-Source software	(Sundberg, 2018)
[7]	[7.1] Encourage personal innovativeness	(Almukhlifi et al., 2019)
Innovation	[7.2] Cyclical interaction between innovation (use of new technologies), new public services delivered, and new pressure to innovate again	(Mergel et al., 2019)
[8] Legal/Normative	[8.1] Strive to reduce legal complexity or legal gaps	(Avila-Maravilla & Luna-Reyes, 2018; Pereira et al., 2017; Schedler et al., 2019; Sundberg, 2018)
	[8.2] Fight corruption	(Almukhlifi et al., 2019; Pereira et al., 2017; Tchao et al., 2017)
	[8.3] Consider the legal and regulatory framework	(Carrasqueiro et al., 2018; Kim et al., 2016; Renteria et al., 2019)

5. Discussion

5.1 Case studies

Regarding the first complementary research question, the case studies identified and analyzed provide evidence of the predominance of DTPS cases related to the executive branch at the central government level.

Denmark and its Faroe Islands territory are noteworthy cases. Denmark boasts the best UN-EGDI 2020 and also ranks in the third position in EU Digital Economy and Society Index – DESI 2020. The Danish case studies have focused on (1) a service; (2) the country as a whole; and (3) enablers of the Danish approach. Besides, as a microstate, the Faroe Islands had two studies evaluating ICT adoption in the territory.

In turn, India has the highest number of published cases analyzed: three in 2017 and three in 2019. The cases from 2017 report (1) the automation of two public services, and (2) a large-scale service implemented via an agile approach at the central and regional levels. Moreover, the cases published in 2019 address (1) a framework for advising, evaluating, and accelerating DT; (2) ten automation projects that reduced service time, among other benefits; (3) DT as a means for reducing corruption.

Another aspect worth mentioning is the description of interaction mechanisms between the government levels in studies that assess cases implemented in Norway, Denmark, and Sweden.

Valuable lessons learned can be identified from the main results presented in each case, and the case list constitutes a benchmark index for practitioners.

5.2 Processes

The second complementary research question regards the processes applied to digital transformation projects in the public sector. The articles focused on processes are fewer in number than those that describe cases or success factors. Nonetheless, due to its transformational character and scope of application, processes are an important object of study.

Regarding the classification by typology, despite the idealized classification, all the identified processes were classified as project life cycle-centric type, with more significant concern for implementation. In this sense, all project life cycle-centric studies describe the stages of a DT project.

Another key point worth highlighting in this type of project is the concern not only with closure but also with the assessment of post-implantation impact; and, in some cases, also concerns with maintenance, support, and updating. This post-implantation concern seems to be focused on the effectiveness of actions, and directly contributes to the realization of the strategy. It also aligns with more modern concepts of project management (Varajão, 2018), such as the extension of the project’s life cycle to cover the impact analysis and promote any necessary adjustments.

Practitioners find in the reported processes several alternatives for defining their digital transformation projects in the public sector.

5.3 Success factors

The main research question regards the factors that can influence the success of digital transformation initiatives in the public sector. After consolidation and systematization, the analysis of the success factors, based on the number of references to each one, allowed identifying the most reported success factors in DTPS.

Regarding the strategy dimension, the most cited success factors refer to the need of governance structures and practices (factors 1.1 and 1.2) to enable DT, followed by adoption of portfolio, program, and project management (factor 1.3), as well as IT leadership (factor 1.4), and the support of top management (factor 1.5). The next most relevant factors are securing political support and sustaining IT investments (factors 1.6 and 1.7) to provide stability and sustainability to the initiative. It is also worth highlighting the factor of promoting trust in e-Gov services (factor 1.10), which is in line with the arguments by Clarke (2020) regarding increasing public trust via the application of ICT (Mahmood, 2016; Morgeson III et al., 2011; Tolbert & Mossberger, 2006).

Parallel to this, people play a central role in DT initiatives in the public sector, as they will conceive, plan and execute projects, as well as sustain the initiatives. The most mentioned success factor is ensuring team awareness and training (factor 2.1), via generic training or via complementary training with specialization on the subject (factors 2.2, 2.3, and 2.4).

Organization is the most populated dimension. In this dimension, the most mentioned success factor regards multilevel governance and management structures (factor 3.1). This factor can be perceived as an enabler of another one – governance structures to enable DT (the most cited regarding the strategic dimension), as both seem critical to the success of initiatives. The second position in this dimension – Promote transparency and openness (factor 3.2) – enables the accountability necessary for the social control of expenses and actions carried out by public agents. The next most mentioned success factor concerns ensuring that the right positions are assigned to leaders and decision-makers (factor 3.3). Still, in the dimension of organization, mention should be made of the adoption of agile approaches (factor 3.4), GDPR compliance (factor 3.5), and, from a more operational perspective, concerns about organizational and process changes, by promoting integration and rationalization, as argued by Mergel et al. (2019).

Within the scope of DTPS initiatives, the citizen is no longer a mere consumer but a co-creator for the successful operationalization of broad digital transformation initiatives in the public sector, as evidenced by the most cited success factor within the citizen dimension (factor 4.1). The citizen involvement is also related to the post-production stage, as it fosters communication and encourages feedback. Still within this dimension, promoting acceptance, adoption, and use of e-Gov feature among the most cited success factors (factor 4.2).

In this sense, the government should collaborate with citizens and partners – including other public agencies, academia, non-profit organizations, and companies – in co-creating value and establishing an ecosystem. This collaborative orientation is patent in the success factors within the ecosystem dimension (factors 5.1 and 5.3); moreover, reducing the digital divide (factor 5.2) is critical to promote acceptance and adoption of e-Gov initiatives.

As mentioned before, DTPS should not be focused on the technology but rather on how governments interact with stakeholders (Barcevičius et al., 2019; Mergel et al., 2019; Williams & Valayer, 2018). However, technology is still an important part and it essentially plays the role of a commodity that enables new services and promotes usability (factor 6.2), being required a proper technological infrastructure (factor 6.1). Despite the non-technological focus, considering emerging digital technologies as an innovation driver (factor 6.3) is also a success factor.

The next dimension, the innovation dimension, features only two factors, each with a single citation, focused on encouraging people to innovate (factor 7.1) and understanding the continuous cycle arising from innovation (factor 7.2). For instance, innovation can generate a new service, which, in turn, when used, will recursively generate pressure for a new innovation cycle. This example illustrates the importance of this dimension.

Finally, the legal and normative dimension is critically focused on reducing the legal complexity of services (factor 8.1), which, together with the legal and regulatory framework (factor 8.3), form the legal foundations for digital transformation initiatives. Still, regarding this dimension, it is worth mentioning the explicit goal of fighting corruption (factor 8.2), which stems as one of the benefits derived from DTPS initiatives.

The presented unified framework of success factors for digital transformation projects in the public sector can be used by practitioners as a checklist of factors in their projects, aiming to reduce the risk of failure and leverage success.

6. Conclusions, limitations, and further work

From the results presented, it is possible to conclude that the extant literature on DTPS offers a wealth of case studies and success factors. In contrast, there is a scarcity of studies describing the processes that underpinned those initiatives or cases.

From a geographical point of view, i.e., taking the countries under study as parameter, the analyzed studies cover the main countries featuring in the UN-EGDI ranking, and are therefore a valuable resource to learn about the best practices. Besides showcasing the experience of countries well ranked in the UN-EGDI, the case studies under analysis also describe the reality of other countries on the African, Asian, and American continents. However, the studies focused on some developed countries are scarce, such as the United States of America, New Zealand, the Netherlands, or Japan, to name a few. The general lack of information regarding this reality does not allow us to infer the cause.

Regarding the processes applied within the scope of DTPS initiatives, the most commonly implemented are project life cycle-centric, compared to e-readiness and strategy-based. It is noticeable a concern with the ex-ante and ex-post phases of projects, regardless of the type of process implemented, seeking effectiveness and alignment with strategy.

By presenting cases, processes, and success factors, there is both a theoretical and practical contribution. In terms of practical contribution, to highlight that professionals in the area can find in our study a compilation of several alternative processes already adopted within the scope of other initiatives, which can be taken into consideration for organizing their digital transformation projects. Practitioners also find a list of success factors that can be used to minimize risks and improve the success of DT projects. In addition, the several cases identified can be used as a benchmark for good practices and to identify new project opportunities.

In terms of theoretical contributions, researchers can find in our study a unified framework of success factors for digital transformation projects in the public sector that enriches the extant body of literature. The compilation of alternative digital transformation processes already implemented in the public sector can serve as a starting point for a new research strand focusing on the development of a unified process based on good practices. The catalog of cases is also useful to identify research gaps and the need for further research.

Our study has some limitations. The search terms used for collecting the articles for the purpose of this literature review may be limited in scope despite having been thought through comprehensively. Thus, synonyms or related concepts may be addressed in future research to build on this work. The focus of our review was on research literature, and future research may focus on grey literature. Moreover, private sector initiatives were not considered, since our study aimed primarily to consolidate the factors that can impact the success of digital transformation initiatives in the public sector.

As future work, beyond exploring the limitations mentioned above, the legal framework for DTPS in the top-ranked countries in UN-EGDI could be analyzed to identify a possible relationship between the legal framework and success in adoption; moreover, a future update of this systematic review will be useful to allow comparing the results pre, during, and post-pandemic. Additionally, regarding success factors, an instrument (e.g., a checklist) could be derived to create a DTPS project readiness index, supporting the evaluation of the conditions to carry out a DT project and assessing the gap between reality and the required environment. Also, a unified process could be derived from the consolidation of the processes analyzed, both by considering the pre-project, planning, execution, and closure phases and the post-implantation phase, and by relating the success factors to the different phases.

Footnotes

Authors biographies

Fernando Escobar is a PhD Student at the University of Minho. He holds a Master’s in Applied Computing from UNB, with research in risk management. He also has Postgraduate in Public Administration from the National School of Public Administration; MBA in Electronic Government from UNA-MG; Bachelor’s Technologist in Data Processing from State University (FATEC-SP). Since August 2016, he is Federal Servant, in the position of IT Judicial Analyst at Tribunal Regional Federal – TRF1, where since May 2018 he has been Supervisor of the Information Systems Management Department. Escobar has over 25 years of experience and is also a PMP.

Washington H. C. Almeida is a PhD Student at the Center of Advanced Studies and Systems of Recife – C.E.S.A.R. Master Degree in Software Engineering at C.E.S.A.R. Specialist in Information Security Management at the University of Brasília (2011). Holds a degree in Information Technology from the Federal Institute of Piauí – IFPI (2004). He is currently a Federal Judicial Analyst (TRF1). He was a Substitute Professor at the University of Brasília – UNB in the Computer Science Department. ISF Certificate ISO/IEC 27002. Has experience in the area of IT, mainly in topics: Information Security, Software Engineering, IT Management and IT Governance.

João Varajão is currently a professor of Information Systems (IS) and Project Management (PM) at the University of Minho. He is also a researcher of the ALGORITMI center. His current research interests are in IS, PM, and IS Development (addressing, particularly, IS and PM success). Before joining academia, he worked as an IS consultant, project manager, IS analyst and software developer, for private companies and public institutions. He has published numerous refereed publications, authored books, edited books, as well as book chapters and communications at conferences. He serves as editor-in-chief, associate editor and member of committees for international journals and conferences.

Appendix A: Queries applied

Base	Query applied
ACM	[[[All: “digital transformation framework”] OR [All: “digital transformation model”] OR [All: “digital transformation”] OR [All: digitization] OR [All: digitalization]] AND [All: “public sector”]] OR [All: “public administration”] OR [All: “public service”] OR [All: “Government”] OR [All: “public sphere”] OR [All: “public organization”] AND [Publication Date: (01/01/2015 TO 03/31/2020)]
IEEE	((((((((((“All Metadata”: “Digital transformation framework”) OR “All Metadata”: “Digital transformation model”) OR “All Metadata”: “Digital transformation”) OR “All Metadata”: Digitization) OR “All Metadata”: Digitalization) AND “All Metadata”: “Public sector”) OR “All Metadata”: “Public administration”) OR “All Metadata”: “public service”) OR “All Metadata”: “Government”) OR “All Metadata”: “Public sphere”)OR “All Metadata”: “Public Organization”)
ISI	TS $=$ ((Digital transformation framework OR Digital transformation model OR Digital transformation OR Digitization OR Digitalization) AND Public sector OR Public administration OR public service OR Government OR Public sphere OR Public Organization)

Appendix B: Articles,contents,and quality criteria

Ref	Case study	Process	Success factor	Limitations	Future works	Final score
(Marzooqi et al., 2017)	X		X	X	X	4
(Carrasqueiro et al., 2018)	X	X	X	X		4
(Sundberg, 2018)	X		X	X	X	4
(Lappi et al., 2019)	X		X	X	X	4
(Pereira et al., 2017)			X	X	X	3
(Singh et al., 2017)	X			X	X	3
(Almukhlifi et al., 2019)			X	X	X	3
(Mergel et al., 2019)			X	X	X	3
(Lindgren & van Veenstra, 2018)	X		X		X	3
(Kompella, 2019)	X			X	X	3
(Lessa & Tsegaye, 2019)	X			X	X	3
(Rehouma & Hofmann, 2018)			X	X	X	3
(Schedler et al., 2019)			X	X	X	3
(Madsen & Kraemmergaard, 2016)	X			X	X	3
(Avila-Maravilla & Luna-Reyes, 2018)	X		X		X	3
(Putri & Sensuse, 2018)			X	X	X	3
(Kaya et al., 2020)			X	X	X	3
(McBride, 2019)	X			X	X	3
(Sangolt & Keitsch, 2016)	X		X		X	3
(Lessa, 2019)	X			X	X	3
(Müller et al., 2018)			X	X	X	3
(Ngonzi & Sewchurran, 2019)	X		X		X	3
(Tchao et al., 2017)	X		X		X	3
(Tambotoh et al., 2017)			X	X	X	3
(Choi et al., 2016)	X			X	X	3
(Cahlikova, 2017)	X			X		2
(Nerurkar & Das, 2017a)	X		X			2
(Hatsu & Ngassam, 2017)		X			X	2
(Al-Shuaili et al., 2019)			X	X		2
(Nerurkar & Das, 2017b)	X		X			2

Ref	Case study	Process	Success factor	Limitations	Future works	Final score
(Filgueiras et al., 2019)	X				X	2
(Rakotonirina & Raoelson, 2018)	X		X			2
(Meyerhoff Nielsen, 2019)	X		X			2
(Paletti, 2018)	X			X		2
(Reascos et al., 2019)	X	X				2
(Enaw et al., 2016)			X		X	2
(Fajar Surya & Amalia, 2017)			X		X	2
(Renteria et al., 2019)			X	X		2
(Defriani & Resmi, 2019)	X	X				2
(Avramchikova et al., 2019)	X					1
(Marino & Pariso, 2019)	X					1
(Scupola, 2018)	X					1
(Prakash & Gunalan, 2019)	X					1
(Ivanova et al., 2019)	X					1
(Shin & Rakhmatullayev, 2019)	X					1
(Mayakul et al., 2019)			X			1
(Ayquipa et al., 2019)	X					1
(Nielsen, 2016)	X					1
(Agarwal et al., 2017)			X			1
(Osifo, 2018)	X					1
(Pappel et al., 2019)	X					1
(Carrillo et al., 2017)			X			1
(Roy, 2019)	X					1
(Anand & Khemchandani, 2019)	X					1
(Rammea & Grobbelaar, 2017)	X					1
(Kim et al., 2016)			X			1

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Digital transformation success in the public sector: A systematic literature review of cases,processes,and success factors

Abstract

Keywords

1. Introduction

2. Background

3. Method

Table 1 Analyzed articles

4. Results

4.1 Case studies

Table 2 Case studies

Table 3 Processes articles

Table 4 Success factors

5.1 Case studies

5.2 Processes

5.3 Success factors

6. Conclusions, limitations, and further work

Footnotes

Authors biographies

Appendix A: Queries applied

Appendix B: Articles,contents,and quality criteria

References

Table 1
Analyzed articles

Table 2
Case studies

Table 3
Processes articles

Table 4
Success factors