AT A GLANCE:
BCA's Digitalisation Masterplan charts a course of pioneering efforts, igniting a trailblazing journey. BCA meticulously tends to its systems, ensuring seamless integration and streamlined processes for both internal and external stakeholders. This diligent endeavour not only guarantees sustainability and scalability but echoes BCA's dedication to serving for generations. Embark with us on Elansaran Arunasalam's journey, a vivid testament to the spirit of a forward-thinking CIO shaping a digitally evolved future.
BACKGROUND:
Elansaran juggles a myriad of responsibilities in his multi-faceted role. He immerses himself daily in the intricate dance of orchestrating digital transformation, deftly managing stakeholders, and overseeing countless, systems and processes forming the heartbeat of BCA’s mission. What sets Elansaran apart is not just his commitment to driving innovation; it is his proactive dedication to transform BCA to be a digital leader that pulses through his every decision.
As the driving force behind BCA’s Digitalisation Masterplan, his commitment goes beyond skills. It is a pledge to lead, innovate, and shape the organisation’s digital future!
NEED FOR UPSKILLING:
In shaping the digital future, one must boldly scrutinise existing legacy systems to ensure a robust and harmonised architecture. What then, was Elansaran's key objective? Actively re-engineer entire business processes to meet evolving needs! Elansaran's journey underscores the necessity for active upskilling with GovTech Digital Academy (DA) - to stay abreast of the rapidly evolving realm of digital transformation.
LEARNING JOURNEY:
Situation
Elansaran needed updated and harmonised systems compliant with IM8 policy requirements. This spurred not just replacement but active re-engineering of business processes through service journey workshops for alignment with modern applications and systems. Resource limitations demanded a delicate balance between lean IT resources and the industry’s swift need for sustainability and scalability. In this challenging landscape, Elansaran strove to forge a tech-savvy future with strategic planning and proactive measures, all while incorporating a holistic review of BCA and its stakeholders’ current and future needs.
Task
Aiming for an enterprise architecture that aligns seamlessly with policy requirements, the team pursued a standard structure compliant with all policy requirements. It acts as a guiding force for swift onboarding, sparing teams the need to reinvent the wheel for each system and consequently accelerating onboarding and delivery. Recognising the need for re-engineering with a product-centric mindset, Elansaran spearheaded the construction of a Software as a Service base application architecture. This intricate brickwork would support BCA current as well as future needs, consolidating numerous applications into a common architecture, without reinventing the wheels.
Action
Elansaran’s learnings from DA’s CIO Milestone Programme empowered him to adjust from a system-centric to a dynamic product-centric mindset. The learnings reinstated the need for agile methodologies, emphasising the swift delivery of Minimum Viable Products (MVPs) for continuous refinement. Moreover, insights from Data Analytics by Design sparked intrigue for him and other CIOs, urging a proactive consideration of policy-specific questions early in the system’s architecture. And what better way to learn than to hear from other industry experts? The invaluable experiences with practitioners (both private and public sector) and practical government context and examples from GovTech Senior Leaders enriched Elansaran’s strategic vision and implementation. Meanwhile, connecting with fellow CIOs facilitated meaningful learning and connections.
Results
Fortified by skills from DA's programmes, Elansaran gained a wider perspective of Ops-Technology Integration for a more coordinated and collaborative development approach for BCA’s key systems. He also targets to champion an in-depth product-centric approach that aims to build quality systems which meets customers’ needs through progressive builds.
Embracing new technologies such as SaaS, Elansaran aspire to continuously refine, improve quality in each release, and shorten time to market.
Concurrently, building data architectures that make data exploration and sense-making easier for BCA departments and senior management. Data analytics and sharing would soon be seamless within BCA and across agencies and stakeholders. Elansaran's integrated skills is reshaping BCA, setting a dynamic course for sustained tech evolution.
“Public service officers need to be competent and capable as we support our agency’s digital transformation efforts. GovTech Digital Academy has numerous upskilling programmes related to digitalisation. These are very relevant in the current time and age to sharpen our knowledge and skills to contribute effectively to the agency’s digital transformation roadmap.”
Elansaran Arunasalam
Chief Information Officer, Building and Construction Authority, GovTech
NEXT STEPS:
Elansaran is eager to attend DA programmes on Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) to further contribute to GovTech and Singapore Public Service by automating tasks and focusing on complex operations.
EMBARK ON YOUR LEARNING JOURNEY:
Keen to embark on your own learning journey?
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