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About the project:
While innovation in the public sector is often overlooked due to its gradual and understated nature, it holds immense potential as a catalyst to accelerate the implementation of SDGs. However, innovation rarely occurs spontaneously or in isolation. It requires clear intention and deliberate effort in an organizational culture that nurtures creative thinking, cultivates strategic partnerships, and tolerates reasonable risks.
It is also necessary to broaden our understanding of public sector innovation beyond technological and digital transformation and view it holistically as a new approach to policymaking, internal processes, and service delivery for enhancing the public sector's effectiveness, responsiveness and inclusiveness.
The project aims to assist the efforts of governments in four target countries - Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Viet Nam, by encouraging the prioritization of innovation practices and fostering innovation experimentation in the public sector in line with their existing national development plan or SDG implementation plan. The project will support the formulation of public sector innovation strategy and/or framework. The first phase is a global study to identify good practices, strategies, policies, and institutional frameworks for promoting public sector innovation. It will be followed by national studies in each target country to analyze and assess the current public sector innovation landscape and identify the most appropriate approach to optimize public sector innovation. Ultimately, the project will assist the target countries in taking the most appropriate action to promote innovation in the public sector—either by drafting a public sector innovation policy and strategy and/or establishing an institution framework dedicated to the public sector, such as an innovation unit or Chief Innovation Officer.
While having an innovation strategy or creating an innovation unit is not an end in itself, it can provide a clearer roadmap for achieving the SDGs and position governments at all levels to better utilize their limited resources to promote inclusive development.
Objectives:
To strengthen the national capacities of target countries to develop an integrated strategy and/or framework for public sector innovation.
Beneficiaries:
Direct beneficiaries include government officials from ministries and governmental institutions at the national and sub-national levels in the four target countries. Indirect beneficiaries include citizens and communities at large.