Several countries from developed through transition to developing economies have implemented public reform programmes aimed at achieving the above goals. Historically, three successive areas of administrative reform have been witnessed. These areas relate to structural reform, capacity building and service improvement. These three waves of public service reform signify a gradual shift from improving internal workings of government through enhancement of skills and improvement in management systems and structures, to transforming external relationships of government with its various constituencies through high quality services and engagement. A major drive for the successive waves has been the failure of isolated reform strategy. For instance the chances of implementing a successful structural reform strategy without an associated capacity building strategy are very low.

Similarly, the interdependence between e-government programs and public administration reform programs is increasingly being appreciated. However, there are shortages of tools and techniques for achieving the desirable alignment between related programs.

The aim of this project is to strategically align the MSAR Public Administration Reform Roadmap and the e-government Development Program (2005-2009) by mapping or linking the policy goals, strategies, major initiatives and concrete actions (projects and programs) under both agendas. The project also aims to specify and develop a monitoring and evaluation framework as part of a continuous alignment solution, from policy goals to concrete projects.

In line with the above aim, the project objectives include:

O1) Consolidating PA reform information - from policy goals, through strategic priorities to initiatives and concrete projects

O2) Consolidating e-government program design - from policy issued by office of the Secretary for Public Administration and Justice (SAJ), to concrete cross-agency infrastructure projects and other specific projects undertaken by individual government agencies

O3) Carrying out a gap analysis of PA Reform initiatives and the e-Government policies in Macao at different levels from policy to concrete projects

O4) Revising the five year e-government plan in view of the outcome of the gap analysis activity in (O3)

O5) Identifying a list of e-government projects from the updated roadmap that are crucial to the implementation of the new PA policy which could be carried out in the context of the ongoing e-Macao Program

O6) Providing a Strategic Alignment Toolkit (SAT) to guide SAFP on how to continuously align PA reform activities with e-government initiatives with an integrated support for performance monitoring and evaluation

O7) Training government personnel on how to effectively use the developed toolkit

Instrument Development – involves the development of the necessary forms, analysis tables and database design for the exercise.

• Consolidation of PA Reform Structure – aggregating relevant information on MSAR PA reform program from various sources, including PA Reform Roadmap, Concrete project proposals and so on.
• Consolidation of Electronic Government Policies and Initiatives – compiling all e-government policies, strategies, initiatives and projects from various sources including the five-year e-government plan document and available project and program documents.
• Development of Strategic Alignment Map – encoding the information gathered through tasks T2 and T3 using the instruments developed in T1.
• Gap Analysis – developing alignment rules and checking these rules against the Strategic Alignment Map information.

• Writing the Gap Analysis Report – documenting the results and findings of T5.
• Writing Revision Notes for E-Government Plan – documenting necessary modifications to the existing five-year plan to account for the findings in T5.

• Development of Strategic Alignment Toolkit – documenting the essential steps of this project as a process with information on how to use the developed instruments as a basis for continuous strategic alignment by SAFP.
• Development of the Performance Management Guide – modifying the methodology proposed by the World Bank in the METER toolkit to monitor and evaluate the impact of e-government initiatives on PA reform policies. The task also involves the integration of the assessment process into the strategic alignment process.
• Development of Training Manuals – producing training manuals for training SAFP staff on the use of the developed toolkit and assessment guide.
• Training of SAFP Personnel – conducting the training program.

D1) Gap Analysis Report – documents the observed inconsistencies and gaps with respect to the PA Reform Roadmap vis-à-vis the five year e-Government Plan.

D2) Revised MSAR Electronic Government Roadmap – documents detailed revision notes for current MSAR e-Government Plan in view of the gap analysis results.

D3) Strategic Alignment Toolkit (SAT) – documents the process and the use of the instruments for carrying out the strategic alignment exercise. The toolkit is to be used by SAFP for the continuous alignment of PA reform and e-government policies, strategies, initiatives and projects.

D4) Performance Management Guide – documents a guide for the continuous measurement of impact of the e-government initiatives on PA reform goals. This guide is integrated with SAT in D3.

D5) Training Manual – A set of training materials to be used for training SAFP personnel on the use of SAT and the PMG.

The following categories of events will be organized as part of the project:

1) Stakeholders’ workshop - attended by SAJ and the agency directors to present and discuss the outcome of the alignment exercise.

2) Training Program - involves the training of government IT staff and other categories of employees involved in IT planning on how to carryout strategic alignment activities using the developed toolkit.

The project results will inform the revision of relevant documents such as the e-government development policy and the Public Administration Reform Roadmap.

The Office of the Secretary for Administration and Justice (SAJ), the Public Administration Civil Service (SAFP) and government agencies are the 3 major stakeholders and beneficiaries of the project. SAJ is expected to have better policy outcomes from a more consistent public administration reform and electronic government agenda.

SAFP as the focal agency for PA policy development and implementation as well as e-government development in Macao is the primarily beneficiary of the project. The project is expected to increase the capacity and effectiveness of SAFP in discharging these two important functions. Since the project is expected to lead to consolidation and better coordination of both PA policy vis-à-vis e-government initiatives, all agencies are expected to have better information and understanding of existing e-government initiatives and how these initiatives directly support key PA policy areas. With such better understanding, agencies are expected to be better motivated for initiating innovative e-government projects. Overall, vertical alignment between SAJ policy expectations and agency policy implementations initiatives are better guaranteed.

The total duration for the project is 6 months. The project officially commenced on January 1, 2008 and will end by June 30, 2008.

Project schedule - to be written.

The major partner for the project is the Public Administration and Civil Service Bureau, Macao SAR Government.

The project team includes:

1. Adegboyega Ojo - Lead
2. Bimal Pratap Shah - Strategy
3. Khoi Nguyen - Technical
4. Tomasz Janowski - Advisor

Project risks - to be written.

Conclusions and lessons learnt - to be written.