The slow progress of digital transformation in public organizations has been a source of concern, not least due to a lack of digital government competences (DGCs). We approach the persisting issue by drawing on resource-based theory and human capital. We conceptualize DGCs as knowledge, skills, abilities, and other characteristics (KSAOs), which compose digital government-related human capital resources. We further posit that a lack of such resources on the individual level negatively impacts transformation capabilities on the organizational level. To substantiate our claims, we perform a competence assessment based on job advertisements. We analyzed 2,869 job ads from local governments in Germany, Australia, and New Zealand using a job-mining approach that combines large language models and topic modeling. Our findings reveal that DGCs are notably scarce in these job ads, which helps explain the slow progress of digital government pursuit. Our study contributes to research by providing a novel theoretical foundation for the literature stream on DGCs, framing them as KSAOs as the foundation for human capital resources. We also share our job-mining pipeline for replication and adaptation by other researchers. Finally, we propose four action points to address the challenges from a hiring perspective.

The abundance of digital technologies poses a challenge for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs), which must identify, select, and implement appropriate solutions to innovate their business. Digital transformation requires SMEs to undertake a continuous digitalisation process, but a lack of guidance has led to many SMEs’ failures to embrace the potential of digital technologies. To meet this challenge, IS research has developed procedure models that structure the digital transformation process. The literature suggests that such models should have a reasonable level of flexibility and should integrate external digital innovation units to support SMEs. Research provides a promising basis for developing procedure models that meet these requirements, but extensive evaluations of these models in a naturalistic setting remain to be explored. The present study addresses this gap by developing a procedure model following the Design Science Research based on eight digitalisation projects with industry partners. The study concludes that the model provides the flexibility needed to adapt it to SMEs’ various circumstances and integrates the role of external digital innovation units. Thus, it helps SMEs initiate and advance their digital transformation. The results contribute to the body of knowledge concerning reference modelling, digital transformation, and innovation.

An early step in designing information systems (IS) is eliciting design requirements. Traditionally, these requirements focus on product characteristics, such as desired functionalities. However, this technology-centered approach often neglects the broader context of IS design, which significantly influences project outcomes. While IS scholars emphasize the importance of context awareness, clear guidance on achieving it remains lacking-particularly for marginalized communities, where the context differs substantially from that of typically non-marginalized researchers and developers. Marginalized communities, such as the Deaf community, possess distinct cultural identities shaped by histories of discrimination and exclusion. Successfully conducting IS research and design in these contexts demands profound context awareness. We derive our argument for the importance of context awareness from the theory of Value Sensitive Design and the principles of sociotechnical design. We propose that context awareness is essential for the project to be perceived as legitimate by the marginalized community, which is crucial for the project's success. To help researchers become more context-aware, we present 42 design requirements resulting from a two-year iterative design science research project conducted in collaboration with the Deaf community. These design requirements encompass the research project, the IS design process, and the final product. This article contributes to the literature on inclusive IS design, Value Sensitive Design, and the development of assistive technologies.

The adoption of digital technologies is far from trivial. Especially for Small and Medium-sized Enterprise with their limitations in resources. To overcome these limitations, cooperation with academia has proven to be useful. However, these cooperation are heavily dependent on personal connections. Despite research regarding the formation process, the initial step, identifying a contact person, remains ambiguous. By conducting 15 interviews with academia and practitioners who successfully establish such cooperation, we provide insights for forming cooperation between academia and Small and Medium-sized Enterprise. The interviews were analyzed using an inductive approach. This resulted in 381 codes, 13 2nd-order themes, and four dimensions. Ultimately, four exemplary strategies for how to leverage the framework are demonstrated. These strategies provide actionable pathways for both Small and Medium-sized Enterprise and academia to initiate and maintain successful cooperation and illustrate how the developed framework can be used by Small and Medium-sized Enterprise and universities to identify suitable strategies for improving their ability to establish contact with potential partners.

Educational programmes in eGovernment or digital government attract a diverse set of students who are interested in the public sector and technological trends. These programmes aim to train a new generation of digital government professionals. However, we know relatively little about how such programmes succeed in training translators who are able to bridge the world of the public sector and that of digitalization. In this paper we systematically study the characteristics and motivations programme applicants to the Erasmus Mundus MSc in Public Sector Innovation and eGovernance, as well as the programme outcomes in terms of the substantive interests of students as reflected in MSc theses and post-study career choices. We find that the number of applicants from an IT or tech background remains rather low, and that the applicants almost exclusively come from outside of Europe. Applicants show a good grasp of the relevance and urgency of digital transformation to develop their countries, yet application letters suggest a weaker tech-inspired motivation to study digital public governance. Finally, we find that consulting firms with a specialisation in public sector projects and digital governance hold significant appeal to graduates.

Communication plays a pivotal role in our society and, for many, relates to oral communication. Deaf people have always relied on sign-based communication and sign languages. However, for the last two centuries, they have been deprived of equal participation opportunities in a world designed for the Hearing. Targeting the communication barrier between the Deaf and the Hearing, this article aims to develop design requirements for an assistive technology that operates at the intersection between sign language and spoken language, facilitating communication at eye level. The opportunities provided by interdisciplinary development and new technological means allow us to envision a new generation of assistive technologies that foster inclusion instead of creating artificial hierarchies. We employ a Design Science Research approach incorporating a literature review, a web-content analysis, and interviews. We present 18 functional design requirements, eight UI and UX requirements, and nine requirements for the development process.

Trading decisions often encounter risk and uncertainty complexities, significantly influencing their overall performance. Recognizing the intricacies of this challenge, computational models within information systems have become essential to support and augment trading decisions. The paper introduces the concepts of trading software agents, investment strategies, and evaluation functions that automate the selection of the most suitable strategy in near real-time, offering the potential to enhance trading effectiveness. This approach holds the promise of significantly increasing the effectiveness of investments. The research also seeks to discern how changing market conditions influence the performance of these strategies, emphasizing that no single agent or strategy universally outperforms the rest. In summary, the overarching objective of this research is to contribute to the realm of financial decision-making by introducing a pragmatic platform and strategies tailored for traders, investors, and market participants in the FOREX market. Ultimately, this endeavor aims to empower people with more informed and productive trading decisions. The contributions of this work extend beyond the theoretical realm, demonstrating a commitment to address the practical challenges faced by traders and investors in real-time decision-making within the financial markets. This multidimensional approach to financial decision support promises to enhance investment effectiveness and contribute to the broader field of algorithmic trading.

PurposeOne impediment of e-government implementation is the lack of e-(government) competences among public officials, especially because foundational education programs fail to teach them. Therefore, this study suggests massive open online course (MOOC)-based continuous education. This study aims to design and evaluate a MOOC and MOOC platform for acquiring e-competence in the public sector and principles for such platforms to capture their inherent design knowledge.Design/methodology/approachThis study uses design science research incorporating qualitative and quantitative methods and draws on established patterns of formulating design principles (DPs).FindingsThe core results are a physically instantiated MOOC platform and six DPs: DP of 1) easy access and easy use, 2) professional exchange, 3) protected space, 4) domain focus, 5) cooperation with higher education institutions and 6) promotion from higher government level.Research limitations/implicationsThis study contributes to e-government research by extending the design knowledge for the construction of domain-specific MOOC platforms. Moreover, the study contributes to platform economics by discussing existing theses and outlining new opportunities. The research also entails limitations, as the authors have solely considered MOOCs and neglected complimentary offers to sustain learning success.Practical implicationsThis study provides practitioners with design principles they can use in their efforts to construct education platforms for the public sector. Moreover, the study presents a working MOOC platform instantiating these DPs, and thus provides an exemplary reference.Social implicationsNot fulfilling expectations regarding digital public services comes with a risk of decreasing trust in public organizations and the overall government. The results of this study contribute to enabling public officials fulfilling stakeholders' expectations and generating public value.Originality/valueBy linking e-government competence education with MOOC platform design, this research approximates an important research gap. Scholars previously investigated e-competences and focused on alone-standing MOOCs to convey those. The results of this study offer the potential to construct platforms to centralize such fragmented solutions, maximizing their impact among public officials.

Digital Government Competences are vital for digital transformation in public administration. However, research has mostly focused on the acquisition of new competences, neglecting prevailing ones that contradict transformation efforts. We address this shortcoming by adopting an unlearning perspective, which depicts the process of discarding obsolete competences that hinder rather than foster change. Consequently, we present the results of a focus group study with 34 public servants and subsequent in-depth qualitative analysis. We apply the lens of an established competence framework that defines competence dimensions as individual and organizational as well as visible (observable behavior) and hidden (cognitive mechanisms). The results identify both individual and organizational competences in 24 categories that must be unlearned to unlock the potential of digital transformation in public administration without legacy burdens. We contribute to digital government research by complementing the competence discourse with an unlearning perspective and offer practitioners a new angle on continuous education.

The performance of a service process can be improved by the early anticipation of future behavior, such as predicting the next activity using predictive business process monitoring (PBPM). Recent PBPM techniques are based on deep neural networks (DNNs) and consider the process context to create accurate predictions. To provide explainability of these predictions, model-agnostic explainable AI (XAI) methods, for example, SHAP, can be used. However, creating these explanations is time-consuming and, therefore, not applicable to service processes where customers are involved. In this paper, we propose a context-aware DNN-based technique to efficiently create meaningful explanations of next activity predictions using layer-wise relevance propagation. We evaluate the predictive quality and the explanation creation time, using three real-life service event logs. Further, we demonstrate its visual output, highlighting its utility for end-users.

For users to adopt information systems, they must develop trust in such systems. Even though trust theories consistently define trust as dynamic, the development of trust over time has received little empirical attention. The present study examined the development of trust in a newly introduced information system and its association with antecedents related to the individual (e.g. disposition to trust), the information system (e.g. reliability), and the context (e.g. support) at different time points. We further assessed users' reliance, performance, and well-being as outcomes of trust. Employees (N = 313) of a German public university assessed a newly introduced invoice processing system on four occasions (before system launch, after initial use, five months after launch, ten months after launch). Results from latent growth curve modelling show a non-linear increase of trust in the information system over time with changing predictors: Person factors were stronger predictors of trust in early phases, whereas system characteristics were stronger predictors later in the process. Moreover, users' trust in the information system correlated positively with reliance, performance, and well-being. Our results highlight the central role of trust for the successful adoption of information systems at work, and offer specific suggestions for their building and maintenance.

Digital transformation is a complex yet indispensable endeavor for SMEs. Hence, SMEs initiate and implement digital innovation projects to drive their digital transformation but face difficulties in the initiation phase, which could lead them to embark on projects with little value. As a remedy, SMEs may collaborate with external digital innovation units to support their project initiations. However, underlying project characteristics are often poorly understood, so much so that initiations often happen ad hoc. The research goal of this article is to develop a taxonomy that supports the initiation of digital innovation projects in SMEs in collaboration with external digital innovation units. The taxonomy development combines both conceptual and empirical perspectives. The former is informed by a structured literature review. The latter emerges from analyzing 210 project reports of German SMEs. The resulting taxonomy comprises 10 dimensions and 30 characteristics. Based on the taxonomy and the analyzed projects, 5 project types are derived by using cluster analysis methods. External digital innovation units can use the taxonomy and the 5 project types to classify and better understand digital innovation projects in SMEs. The article contributes to the body of knowledge and facilitates future research on digital innovation projects in SMEs.

The digital transformation of the public sector needs laws that are designed to foster digitization. Scholars have long investigated different aspects of the legislative process and how to enhance it with regard to digital meaningfulness. However, to date, there is scarce research to expand these efforts beyond the legislator and consider public authorities charged with the enforcement of laws. The study employs a qualitative research approach to bridge this gap. We conducted nine expert interviews, aiming to introduce design requirements for a digitization check that considers public authorities enacting and enforcing legislation. Fourteen design requirements were established, which are essential for implementing a digitization check. Complementary to the requirements, subjects to be covered by the check are presented. The results of this study enable practitioners to the legislative process and call for scholars to deepen their understanding of digital-ready legislation.

As a sudden, external event, the COVID-19 pandemic rapidly disrupted the workplace and required organizations to digitalize their working approaches. To understand how such external events affect organizations in the short- and long-term, we investigated the case of a higher education institution's administration, which combines features of public and private organizations. We applied a longitudinal case study and conducted interviews with 39 German higher education institution (HEI) employees at two time points during the first (2020) and second (2021) lockdown. Content analyses revealed that a general openness toward change and distinct technical infrastructure enabled efficient coping with the pandemic despite struggles with digitalization and rigidity. Advantages in work outcomes were contrasted with losses in social interactions. Flexible models (e.g., working from home or the office) were desirable long-term work concepts. We integrated our findings in a framework on factors that contribute to supporting organizational adaptations and derived practical recommendations.

A citizen-centric view is key to channeling technological affordances into the development of future cities in which improvements are made with the quality of citizens' life in mind. This paper proposes City 5.0 as a new citizen-centric design paradigm for future cities, in which cities can be seen as markets connecting service providers with citizens as consumers. City 5.0 is dedicated to eliminating restrictions that citizens face when utilizing city services. Our design paradigm focuses on smart consumption and extends the technology-centric concept of smart city with a stronger view on citizens' roadblocks to service usage. Through a series of design workshops, we conceptualized the City 5.0 paradigm and formalized it in a semi-formal model. The applicability of the model is demonstrated using the case of a telemedical service offered by a Spanish public healthcare service provider. The usefulness of the model is validated by qualitative interviews with public organizations involved in the development of technology-based city solutions. Our contribution lies in the advancement of citizen-centric analysis and the development of city solutions for both academic and professional communities.