In the Government of Bangladesh, no such method exists other than DSDL, which assists and supports the Government extensively to achieve the “Digital Bangladesh” Goal.

• Through this method, Ministry/Department/organization can formulate design and implementation plan for digitalization of their public services in just 6-7 days (which usually takes 7/8 months) at their own capacity even if they have no or inadequate necessary skills & capacity in digitalization and e-Government implementation.
• It’s a Synergistic process to generate a self-designed masterplan by Service Recipients, Service Providers, Decision makers and ICT Specialists which creates strong ownership.
• A-Z step by step Plan is generated through this “Magic Model” (Assessment, Analysis, Designing, Implementation Plan, Roadmap, Masterplan).
• There is no lecture but Hands on work.
• Using Minimum Resource, you get Maximum Result!

DSDL is being held since 2019 by the Digital Service Accelerator team of a2i, ICT Division. In 2019-2021, the implementation plan of Integrated Digital Service Delivery Platform (IDSDP) have been designed for 11 ministries/departments which are currently in the development stage (117 software). In 2021, digitization masterplan was planned and designed for Bangladesh Post (30+ software and 13 innovations) based on which 2 projects have been initiated. In 2022, “Vision-41: Smart ICT Division” Masterplan Roadmap was formulated for ICT Division and it’s subordinate 8 departments/organizations and 100 initiatives were designed. Currently, preparations for designing the masterplan roadmap of 3 other ministries are ongoing. We have provided digitization support to the Philippines and Fiji through DSDL approach and is in the process of providing digitization support to Cambodia, Somalia and Ghana.

We have collaborators from Bangladesh Computer Council (BCC), Department of Information and Communication Technology (DoICT), Bangladesh National Digital Architecture (BNDA), Software Quality, Testing and Certification (SQTC), Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services (BASIS), Academia (BUET, DU,JU etc.), Private IT Firms, Intl. Consulting Organizations etc. They contribute with their expertise to design digital services and formulate implementation plans.

The stakeholders of DSDL are the 58 Ministries, 400 Govt. Organizations and 10,000 Govt. Offices. The ultimate beneficiaries are the citizens of Bangladesh.

30 Ministries and their 150+ Organizations have designed & planned 225 software covering 1624 services through DSDL. As a result, 11 Ministries/organizations are developing 117 software (Procurement Worth Tk. 100 Cr.+). 80+ software have already been developed till date.

• When digitalization activities were less familiar, sensitizing about its necessity to the Govt. officials was tough. But implementation of digital systems in different ministries through DSDL, has inspired others to use this method for their ministries also.
• Through DSDL, capacity for Manual service analysis, Digital service design and managing digital systems has increased in Govt. officials.
• Designing their own ministry and Organizations digital service with their own capacity has strengthened the ownership in Govt. officials.
• Overall Time, Cost, Visit to avail public service has reduced.

Though Government has designed and implemented tremendous successful projects for simplifying the service process delivery through DSDL method, it has some difficulties in some cases like:

• To design digital systems through determining the ultimate outputs and results by pre-analysis and collective analysis.
• To sensitize the service provider organization for organizing DSDL.
• Conducting DSDL as an interesting journey so that participants don’t feel monotonous.
• To choose the right person as a domain expert, focal point, IT expert, and citizen for the right software design and implementation plan.

Therefore, we arrange for a series of discussion sessions, planning sessions, meetings, and sensitization workshops with officers and high officials like policy makers 1-2 months before DSDL.

With the practical experience of this method implementation, we found some areas which make this method successful :

• Generic approach but highly customized program design for each Ministry, based on their requirement and types of services they are providing
• Conducting analysis, R&D and survey prior to DSDL
• Leadership approach by the Decision makers of a Ministry/Org.
• Visualizing the ultimate goal to achieve for methodical designing.
• Visualizing how a solution or system will be utilized finally.
• Sketching the service grouping and selecting the right set of domain experts (civil servant), Policy/Decision makers, IT Specialists and others for analysis and design.

DSDL is one of the most popular digitization methods among ministries of Bangladesh. So, different organizations and ministries are conducting DSDL with their own method following our DSDL concept and without our assistance. For example:

• Internal Resources Division (IRD) of Ministry of Finance (MoF) is doing their own DSDL.
• HD Media team of Aspire to Innovate (a2i) is doing DMDL (Digital Media Planning Lab) for different ministries. DMDL is mainly designed for accelerating media and promotional activities of different ministries where they followed the DSDL method and effectively performed on their own. Purabi Matin ([email protected]) is the focal point for DMDL implementation.

Major key learnings of DSDL:

• DSDL is a very good illustration of a synergistic approach which fully supports the proverb “United we stand, divided we fail” as the designing and planning is done together by Service Recipients, Service Providers, Decision makers and ICT specialists.
• If you can put the right people, right expertise and right effort together in an intelligent, efficient and impactful way, 7 months of work can be done in 7 days.
• If someone designs their services with their hands on active participation and brainstorming, it creates a high sense of ownership towards implementing and maintaining their products/services.