At the National Shared Services Office (NSSO), we provide HR, pensions and payroll administration as well as finance shared services for close to 165,000 public sector customers across almost 60 Government Departments and Public Service Bodies such as An Garda Síochána, Defence Forces and Irish Prison Services.
I undertook the Professional Diploma in Creativity, Innovation and Leadership through the UCD Innovation Academy last year, and following on from my course, I moved into the role of Head of Transformation, which is an exciting opportunity to reimagine and rethink how we work by breaking down our internal operating silos, implementing new processes and engaging with new technologies to better service our customers.
Established in 2012, the NSSO is a relatively new organisation by Civil Service standards, but it has grown rapidly during this time and is now one of the largest shared services in the country. This rapid expansion has also led to many challenges as we have inherited poor transactional processes, lack of standardisation and multiple customer IT platforms along the way.
Now, we are taking a step back and are shifting our focus to view our services through a customer lens. To do this the Business Transformation Design team and the Transformation Management Office were established and are now under my remit to focus on innovation transformation and getting the customer experience right.
One example of this is that instead of having separate HR and payroll touchpoints where customers have to repeat their queries, we are moving toward a “tell me once” approach. This means cross-training our staff to handle queries across different areas, reducing possible areas of frustration while improving our efficiency.
Parallel to this, the NSSO is running an extensive culture programme focusing on staff development. We’re looking at how to upskill our people and give them a central role in developing the culture of the organisation. We are encouraging staff to question our processes and contribute ideas for improvement.
Of course there are challenges. Government legislative changes can mean we have to pause transformation projects. Accessing subject matter experts is tricky as they are often tied up in day-to-day operations. When they invest time in innovating we need to properly support those ideas. We need a central repository for innovative ideas and better ways to capture and implement them. There are plenty of good ideas out there; we just need better systems to nurture and develop them.
Being a transactional organisation with strict deadlines it can be challenging to create space for innovation. Even taking subject matter experts out of operations for an hour means they have to make up that work later. I believe that staff dealing with day-to-day operations should have the opportunity to implement their idea directly, be part of the transformation and innovation NSSO community, and inspire others to share and implement their ideas too. Despite these challenges, we’re making progress and we are committed to this journey of transformation and innovation.
As an innovation leader, I firmly believe in the value of champions at senior levels who are truly invested in transformation. It is crucial for leaders to demonstrate innovation and make time for strategic thinking and planning.
I’m a strong advocate for open communication – I want people to tell me what’s working and what isn’t. Being approachable and visible is essential. Follow through also matters. If people engage in an innovation project, those ideas should not just get filed away. It happens when we don’t have the space, the time, or the energy to implement them; this can lead to disillusionment from staff who have put in the effort to make a difference.
We’ve recently set up an Innovation Hub in one of our offices, creating a space where people can think and interact with my innovation team. It’s not fancy – just whiteboards, sticky notes, markers and separate breakout areas – but it’s a simple process which works for us and encourages collaboration, ownership and participation in design thinking.
“I am passionate about influencing others, harnessing team energy to tackle challenges, and applying these skills to innovative projects. The Professional Diploma gave me an opportunity to be a part of both a national and international community of innovators, reignited my passion and prepared me to guide the NSSO into a future filled with transformation opportunity.”