GovTech Poland

Changing the way the public sector acquires technology to improve services and the experience for citizens is part of the core of govtech. Building a modern and efficient administration does not just mean adding a digitization tool, but changing the culture and way of working to leverage this digital revolution for the benefit of society. Civil servants, with the right digital skills, have the opportunity to lead this digital transformation. GovTech Poland's program is a very good example of leading the digital transformation in the most innovative way: leveraging the creativity and innovation of society and startups and small businesses and finding in public procurement an ally to develop and pilot innovative solutions.

How it all started: the power of a hackathon

Today we tell you the story of GovTech Poland, where it all started in 2017 with a hackathon. More than 2,500 people attended the largest hackathon in Europe with the aim of solving a challenge presented by the Polish government's tax department. The challenge: find a solution to tax fraud in 48h. The individuals and teams with the best solutions were given the opportunity to further develop their idea, for which they were given access to the department's IT infrastructure to test, integrate and validate the solution. In a few months and thanks to one of the solutions, tax fraud in Value Added Tax was reduced by 80%. Seeing the success of the initiative, it was decided to standardize the process and bring more government departments on board. This is how GovTech Poland was born, and as Justyna Orlowska, program manager, comments in this Apolitical article: GovTech Poland is a program that seeks a modern and efficient administration, not only by changing the software, but also the way of thinking and acting.

After the value acquired in this hackathon, in October 2019, GovTech Poland consolidates as an inter-ministerial team of the Office of the Prime Minister of Poland. This implies that they operate across the public sector to coordinate strategic digital projects. They also collaborate with other public entities and municipalities in the country.

Among their main activities is the open innovation program 'GovTech Competitors', based on challenges identified by public teams and piloting innovative solutions proposed not only by startups, but also by research groups or citizens. They also organize hackathons and awards to mobilize the country's innovative and entrepreneurial ecosystem. GovTech Poland is also part of international initiatives such as CivTech Alliance to share learning with similar organizations.

Public procurement at the service of innovation

As Justyna Orlowska, program manager, explains, the most complicated part of starting GovTech Poland was to propose and develop the legal infrastructure to support the open innovation process with startups. Not only a format that would facilitate the piloting and scaling of innovative solutions was taken into account, but also that the technical infrastructure would be compatible with the legal requirements and standards of objectivity when evaluating proposals.

Buying innovation is not an easy task, since the team or department that hires is unlikely to know what technical specifications or functionalities it needs. Even in the case of new and innovative solutions, which solution best fits their need. So writing the bidding documents can be mission impossible.

Given the context, the GovTech Poland team decided to use the figure of the 'project tender', present in the EU legal framework and the provisions of the Polish Public Procurement Act. In Spain it would be the equivalent of Article 183 of the Public Sector Contracts Act and which we will tell you more about soon.

This figure allows awarding a prize to the best idea proposed in the call for solutions to solve the challenge posed by a public team. Subsequently, the team or startup that owns the idea is invited to work in collaboration with the public team to further develop the proof of concept and reach a minimum viable product. In the event that this is successful, the startup has access to a negotiated contract without advertising to scale the solution in the public institution.

Learnings from GovTech Poland

Since the initiative started with a hackathon and in the various editions of the 'GovTech competitors' lab, the GovTech Poland team has faced different challenges and learnings:

On the one hand, one of the main obstacles for startups that want to work with the public sector is uncertainty or little knowledge of the process. Therefore, they dedicated efforts to use accessible language and to be very precise and transparent in the description of the procedure and the steps to follow. They found that this had a very relevant impact when it came to attracting start-ups.

On the other hand, civil servants also suffer from uncertainty in the use of new technologies and ways of working. GovTech's team focused on defining the responsibilities of each team and its members, defining processes and work channels, as well as training to gain confidence. Once this obstacle is overcome, the enthusiasm and evolution of the public teams is one of the most rewarding parts according to Justyna Orlowska, and these same people become fantastic GovTech ambassadors.

If you would like to share a program from your organization with the govtech community, feel free to write to us at hello@gobe.studio.