How Unified Communications (UC) Transforms Citizen Engagement in the Public Sector

The public sector paradox

“82% of public sector respondents say some change or significant change is required to their customer engagement and communications, with 13% requiring a new strategy entirely.” – RingCentral

The public sector faces a paradox. Organisations are under enormous pressure to deliver better quality services and outcomes at reduced cost. This challenge is only likely to intensify. It opens up an enormous opportunity for technology, specifically unified communications (UC), to drive efficiencies and enable more to be done for less.

Equally, public services need to be able to adapt and innovate quickly. The right UC solution will ensure local government, healthcare and higher education services can both scale and evolve in the future.

Transformative UC can help the public sector improve citizen experiences, resolve issues first time, optimise resources and nurture a motivated and empowered team to connect with citizens, patients and students more meaningfully.

“Digital leadership will be less about IT exploitation and management and more about true transformational impact on citizens.” – Socitm 

The right tools to achieve better outcomes

48% of citizens want a simpler and cleaner experience from local government digital services and 42% are willing to try a new service. – Atos

73% of public sector employees would be more likely stay in a job that allowed remote or hybrid working. – The Open University and Public Sector Executive

Today public sector organisations are juggling backlogs and increased demands for diverse, high-quality services with the need for cost-efficiencies. 

In our recent whitepaper, we outline four top priorities to improve outcomes: 

1.    Omni-channel first contact resolution – virtual services delivered across multiple channels in a coordinated and seamless way. 
2.    Employee attraction and retention - simple, flexible and remote working options to motivate and engage younger employees. 
3.    Sustainability credentials – resource and travel reduction to support meeting the government’s Net Zero Strategy and Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) targets. 
4.    Investments as critical operational costs - switching to cloud-based subscription models for UC to help balance squeezed budgets.

Here's why a UC cloud-based solution makes sense:

• Does more for less while improving citizen engagement and satisfaction.
• Scales services faster and demonstrates compliance with the UK government’s Cloud First policy.
• Transforms experiences for both citizens and employees.
• Empowers and unifies teams with improved collaboration and real time data access.
• Financially liberates by dispensing with landline call charges and on-premise management.
• Supports greener remote working reducing emissions, estates and utility usage.
• Gives insights to innovate with securely and ethically harnessed data to drive future service improvements.

Find out how UC supports local government, healthcare and higher education

The generic benefits of a UC solution in supporting digital transformation across the public sector are the same. However, there are other specific reasons why it supports better interactions with local citizens, patients and students.