Network collaboration for digital services for Ukraine refugees

The Ukraine war established a commitment to work across sectors to improve digital services to refugees. Focus on end user needs and an unbureaucratic organizational model have produced tangible results such as:

Better update of address information in national register
Electronic identification - access to digital services

Twelve agencies worked with obstacles and bottlenecks in the refugee's user journey, with the objective of good transitions between services.

Innovation Summary

Innovation Overview

Focus on the end user and an unbureaucratic system have produced tangible results. Refugees from Ukraine now receive, among other things, an electronic ID, they are easier to reach through more updated addresses in the national register, and they receive faster processing decision on residence by a robot at UDI (the immigration administration). A cross-sector and inter-agency network collaboration in the field of digitalization contributed to this. The network collaboration co-existed with traditional bureaucracy and governance structures.

The Ukraine war established a common commitment and necessity to work together to receive a high number of European refugees. The large number of refugees challenged existing processes in the reception of refugees. The desire to create a good user journey for these people was great. 12 agencies have looked together at obstacles and bottlenecks in the refugee's user journey, with attention to good transitions between services.

These were the challenges: the model in Norway is a central arrival center, registration and processing of applications for protection, settlement and integration, and this happens sequentially. Interagency collaboration is known to be challenging. A large number of arrivals was demanding for the administration, but also the fact that the user needs were different from what our model is based on. It was experienced as a small crisis in the big crisis, but a crisis also creates a different commitment that makes things possible.

This is how collaboration started: the Digitalisation Agency (Digdir) was commissioned to put in place a solution for eID for the refugees from Ukraine. In dialogue with different agencies, we saw there was a need for information sharing, dialogue and collaboration in many areas. Digdir proposed to establish a network cooperation model for digital services for Ukraine refugees. One week later, the first collaboration meeting was held.

At the first collaboration meeting, we identified four needs for the collaboration.

Need to further structure and understand the obstacles in the arrival phase/identification
Need to explore the totality, especially in the integration phase
Need for coordination between the agencies
Balance the need for totality versus speed in one's own work

The network collaboration was dialogue-based with regular weekly digital meetings. It was open to anyone who wanted and saw the benefit of participating. We started with seven agencies, and at most there were thirteen agencies. In the weekly digital meetings, each agency was asked to inform about 1-2 things they are currently working on that have or may have significance for the others in the collaboration. This is how we made sure to focus on cross-agency challenges and gaps in the flow of services. In addition the group actively used a common Miroboard to gather information on what had been done on developing user journeys in the agencies and sectors, overview of internet sites and as a tool to work on concrete problems like addresses (service chain map).

We believe that we gave a more systemic (holistic) perspective with the refugee's experience of the meeting with the Norwegian administration. The meetings were summarized in minutes and with an information e-mail distributed to all invitees, with a recommendation to share the information with other stakeholders.

In terms of concrete examples of impact, two of the improvements that the collaboration has delivered are eID and credible address information for this group. The eID for the Ukraine refugees is in place. This is important for refugees in order to be able to access digital services. The public sector can reach the refugee with information quickly and directly, and the refugee can save and retrieve received information in a secure way.

Address information has improved, and more further improvements are being worked on here. It is important for the users that the administration can get in touch quickly, and it is important for agencies in the chain. The agencies in the collaboration delivered several improvements at a high pace. Many laws is changed to make it possible to change processes and services, to meet the needs better. Some examples of solutions:

A robot has been developed that makes most decisions about collective protection. This reduces waiting time for the refugees and the burden on the administration.
To respond to the scattered arrival pattern, the Police has developed an app that police officers can use at the first meeting. This means that they capture information very early on. The information is reused in the processing and shortens the waiting time.

These are some examples of solutions developed and which are already benefiting the end user. Work has begun with more comprehensive information from the administration to the refugee. The aim is to better meet the refugees' needs for information and guidance, regardless of which agency they meet.

Innovation Description

What Makes Your Project Innovative?

Interagency collaboration is known to be challenging. We established an informal network collaboration that was dialogue-based with regular weekly digital meetings. It was open to anyone who wanted and found a benefit in participating. We started with seven agencies, and at most thirteen agencies participated.

In weekly meetings, each agency informed eachothers about 1-2 things they were currently working on that have or may have significance for the others in the collaboration. This contributed to focus on cross-agency challenges and gaps in the flow of services to the Ukrainian refugees. It gave a more systemic (holistic) perspective on the refugee's experience of the meeting with the Norwegian administration. The meetings were summarized in minutes and information was distributed, with a recommendation to share the information further.

Evaluation of the Ukraina Digital collaboration clearly shows that those who participated have experienced this as valuable.

What is the current status of your innovation?

The arrangement of weekly meetings with all the agencies was ended in august. Work om several of the identified development needs and improvement proposals continue. Either by individual agencies or in bilateral collaborations.

One project, more comprehensive and holistic information for the refugees, is awaiting a decision on investment by several of the agencies.

All the agencies contribute to the prevalence of electronic id for the refugees. Access to digital services from the public sector is important. This applies to Ukrainian refugees with temporary collective protection. It is also crucial for the administration as it reduces the workload.

Innovation Development

Collaborations & Partnerships

Directorate of Immigration, Police, Directorate of Integration and Diversity, Directorate of e-health, Directorate of Health, Labour and Welfare Administration, Tax Administration, Agency for Public and Financial Management, Labour Inspection Authority, Institute of Public Health, Health Network, Association of Local and Regional Authorities, Digitalisation Agency, Organisation for Asylum Seekers (NOAS), Institute for Urban and Regional Research (NIBR)

Users, Stakeholders & Beneficiaries

The refugees from Ukraine in comparison to other refugees most likely experienced, at large, a faster process from arrival to settlement due to changes in processes and laws. Direct effect from the innovation has not been measured but we believe electronic ID has a positive effect for entering the society (applying for school, jobs, healthcare services and other). Employees of all the agencies that participated in the collaboration experienced a better knowledge of how services are interrelated.

Innovation Reflections

Results, Outcomes & Impacts

We have carried out a simple evaluation of the collaboration. The agencies that participated state that the collaboration contributed to greater interest from more people in their organizations for the totality of the user journey. There is a greater understanding that services must connect and that improvement of user-experience requires collaboration and trust. The agencies also report good use of better insight into the processes in other agencies, regularly being updated and being able to communicate internally in respective agencies. The agencies got a much broader contact surface towards other agencies and lower threshold for contacting and collaborating with other agencies.

Challenges and Failures

Over time, interest politically, in agency management and in the media decreased. Other matters became more current. This made it challenging to maintain the great commitment of all agencies that participated.

When work on problems/solutions require larger investments by several of the agencies, it can be challenging to prioritise development. Voluntary network cooperation is not binding enough and must be complemented with more solid structure for investment decisions.

When developing services in cooperation that require long-term commitments between the agencies, other governance models are required than a non-binding network collaboration.

After the innovation, identified challenges are being addressed in the ordinary governance structure f.ex. longterm financing. Also the communication of results and value from the network collaboration is being broadly communicated.

Conditions for Success

Success factors for the network collaboration Ukraine digital, which we believe are transferable to other network collaborations:
The user story and user need as the main focal point for the collaboration. A clear user story that hits the heart and creates engagement, and it must be told repeatedly.
Great commitment and willingness to contribute, politically prioritized in all sectors and by management in all agencies.
No unnecessary problematisation of organisation, roles and boundaries between agencies. Unbureaucratic organization
Respect between agencies for having different assignments/missions.
Trust between the agencies that make sharing of issues safe.
One agency takes lead and facilitates the cooperation.
Interdisciplinary competence in the working groups.

Replication

This innovation is very recent. Our mission is to contribute to more innovative collaboration across the structures in the government and administrations. We use the experience in online guidance and advice to others who want to start working with other agencies. In this work, we also draw on experiences from similar collaborations. For example, cooperation during the pandemic (Covid-19).

The experiences are shared in many different arenas, such as conferences, seminars and workshops.

Lessons Learned

We have four recommendations:

Focus on the situation of the end user and what improvements in the user journey can be made. Be curious about the transitions between agencies and how you together can create a better user experience and more coherence in the services.
Build simple structures for the network collaboration to provide a fixed point for dialogue and sharing across agencies. Map and explore common challenges. Establish groups that survey the problems cross-agencies, and preferably pilot solutions within the framework of the network cooperation
Evaluate and collate learning to enable sharing and further development. Take the time to evaluate and share the experiences of the network. It will be useful, even if the subject area is different and adaptation is needed.
Take initiative to gather agencies to map common issues even without a formal mission It's important to dare to try new ways of working. Get concrete and practical experience of interagency cooperation.

Anything Else?

The innovation was formed within an environment that is characterized by strong sector governance at all levels (ministry – directorate – municipality). In our national digitalization strategy a goal or intention is more seamless and integrated digital services for the citizens. This direction of more collaboration takes time to change in existing structures. So the sense of urgency created by war gave the innovation an opening to act on the eminent crisis, thus gaining valuable experience quickly.
Rapid legislative changes created possibilities to improve services, but also challenged existing services to be developed to handle the changes in the laws.