Digital Transformation in NAV IT 2016–2020: Key Factors for the Journey of Change

Abstract

AbstractThe directorate of Labor and Welfare Administration in Norway (NAV) is responsible for one of the most complex system portfolios in Norway. Since the establishment of the directorate in 2006, NAV has had the ambition of modernizing IT systems, but the development has been slow. In the last 4 years, however, there have been major changes in the way NAV works with digital development and modernization. The purpose of the study is to describe the changes that have taken place in the NAV IT department in the period from 2016 to 2020. The survey identifies four key changes that have had a major effect on the IT department in NAV. These key factors are changed organizational design to support the creation of teams and product areas, changed sourcing strategy and insourcing of services, changed technological direction toward a modern application platform and a changeable application architect, as well as changes in working method from waterfall to agile product development. The IT department has moved from being a management-oriented, static organization structured by function to having a flat and dynamic organizational structure with dedicated areas of expertise. NAV replaced all supplier contracts on development and management with capacity agreements, regained ownership of its solutions, recruited programmers, and developed NAV’s internal competence. By developing its own application platform for deployment, NAV IT made it possible for teams to automatically deploy to production whenever they wanted. NAV IT has developed an increasingly agile organization where autonomous teams and empowered employees are a key factor.