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Choose not to let
stress affect the
quality of the service you provide. |
Courtesy
of Melissa Cheah |
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It isn’t an exaggeration when people say that almost
everyone in Singapore has a mobile phone. After
all, mobile phone penetration is a staggering 97.5%!
Coming across a household without Internet connection
is also a rarity with Internet penetration at a
high of 70%. In such a highly wired country, leveraging
on infocomm technologies, or ICTs, to enhance public
service delivery to citizens is a natural progression.
The Singapore Public Service has come a long way
in terms of developing
e-services capability. Today, more than 1,600 government
services are available through the government Internet
portal. The number is still growing.
The CPF Board is one such public agency that has
maximised the advantages that ICTs bring. From self-help
counters, to enabling CPF submissions via the website
and mobile phones, to providing mobile access to
information on your CPF account, to providing Biometric
e-Counters, CPF Board has made sure that ICTs are
exploited to provide greater speed and convenience
to both citizens and employers.
How about those days when you had to queue up to borrow a book? Do you remember
that a librarian had to manually stamp the sheet of paper pasted on the inside cover?
What about paying your library fine? Today, checking out a book and paying library fines
can be done in a matter of seconds at NLB’s e-kiosks.
e-Services have also proliferated internally in the Public Service. Applications like
NFS@Gov and PaC@Gov have brought convenience to public officers, compared to the
days when we dealt almost exclusively with papers and forms.
While e-services can greatly enhance convenience
and efficiency, we mustn’t forget that good service
is above all else, a value and a mindset. As our
two nurses in “At Your Service” show, even the most
stressful of situations won’t affect the quality
of the service you provide, if you are determined
to go the extra mile and take pride in treating
your customers well. Quality service can be manifested
in
e-services too, in the way e-services are designed,
in the way instructions are phrased, in the way
public officers process the
e-services at the backend.
So even as you embark on developing your latest
e-service, remember that hardware is most effective
with a good dose of heartware.
Melissa Cheah Editor, Challenge |
