Australian Taxation Office
By George Koliadis
Project Overview
We have consulted to the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) with Accenture through Holocentric on the ATO Change Program. This project initiated in the 11/2005 and completed in 07/2006.
Our role was to assist in the construction of a well-suited development methodology with a Business Process Management focus. We also participated in a post-hoc evaluation of analysis and design documentation within the project to discover, validate and verify the information contained therin. Below is a brief report of the project context...
Past and Future
The Australian Taxation Office (ATO) is the primary revenue collection agency of the Australian Government. The power to impose taxation in Australia has been available to government as early as 1788. Since establishment, the ATO has grown significantly in size and complexity. The ATO currently (approx.) employs 22,000 individuals, processes 13,000,000 tax returns and operates (both front-office and core processing) in all major cities across Australia.
During its growth, the ATO has faced many operational challenges ranging from the introduction of new taxation systems such as Pay-As-You-Earn (1944), Fringe Benefits Tax (1986), Capital Gains Tax (1985), and Goods and Services Tax (2000), to mass organizational change and IT modernization (Segall et. al., 1994).
The impact of such significant change has regularly been followed by rationalization efforts to standardize on emergent best practice and reduce operational / management complexities. Some examples have aimed to introduce uniformity in the ATO's collection processes - 1942 (ATOHistory, 2006), automate processing systems with mainframe technology - 1972 (Segall et. al., 1994), rationalize client (taxpayer) information - 1991 (Segall et. al., 1994), and standardize on (tailored to segment) client management, interaction, and compliance / risk management processes - 2003-06 (ECMP03, 2006).
Looking towards the future, the ATO's strategic outlook includes both customer and business focused directives.
From a customer perspective, improved support for a 'self-assessment' compliance regime whereby community trust is afforded / encouraged with support 'to comply' and tailored customer strategies. This aims to reduce compliance costs and build community trust via enhanced ATO transparency, fairness, accountability and integrity (D'Ascenzo, M.,2006).
From a business perspective: risk, process, and knowledge management seem to be three primary areas of concern. In order to sustain reduced compliance costs, an "intelligent" risk-based compliance management scheme that targets high-risk non-compliance (e.g. within the large business / international client segment) is in development and roll-out. Standardization and consistency across all core business processes is another objective that aims to improve the management of change, and delegation of responsibility across other interoperating government agencies (i.e. possibly in-line with some emerging whole-of-government strategy). The rollout of rationalized I.T. infrastructure and workflow management technologies as part of the Easier, Cheaper and More Personalized (ECMP) change program is also said to help promote a shift from routine procedural processes (e.g. transaction processing support) to knowledge intensive and value-added practice/case-based behavior (e.g. risk analysis and client assistance / problem solving). A centralized and integrated client management facility is also part of the ECMP program. Finally, improved agility and quicker response to client needs is intended to be part of an improved Business Process and Performance Management capability to be developed within the ATO over the coming years.
IT Management Practice
IT Management Practice within the ATO is primarily governed by AGIMO - The Australian Government Information Management Office, part of the Department of Finance and Administration. In order to provide context, the major areas of IT management practice within the ATO will be discussed, covering: greater IT policy, interoperability, information management and performance improvement. The scope of each relevant area may vary between agency (ATO) and government levels. This is due to the fact that the Australian Government is currently promoting a whole-of-government "big-picture" perspective for ICT management across all agencies.
IT Policies, Standards, Specifications and Guidelines
The development of IT policy and such is currently governed by a new group named the Secretaries' Committee on ICT (SCITC, 2006). This group subsumes the role of the Information Management Strategy Committee within AGIMO. This group has been formed (June, 2006), with the intent to broaden policy management and development with a whole-of-government outlook.
An interesting aspect of the new arrangement is that the SCICT is to be informed by two subgroups - the Business Process Transformation Committee (BPTC), and the Chief Information Officer Committee (CIOC). The prominence of Business Process Management as an agenda for government departments such as the ATO may become a reality under this new government-level arrangement. This will result in improved focus and consideration towards internal and cross-agency operational factors during the development of IT policy and standards.
At an agency level, each group mentioned is responsible for facilitating discussion between member agencies during the development of IT management policy.
IT Interoperability Framework
The Australian Government Technical Interoperability Framework (AGTIF, 2006) intends to provide normative guidelines to facilitate government agency interoperation. Similarities can be drawn with U.S. government initiatives (FEA, 2006).
In general, the AGTIF standardizes/constrains the language, models and standards agencies employ. This ensures consistency during the communication of information, deployment of technical infrastructure / standards, and design of business processes. A number of best practices are also provided to promote agency conformance.
Information Management Framework
The ATO Information Management Framework (ATO-IMF, 2004) describes a number principles and best practices that encourage the development of information as a critical resource within the Taxation Office. The application of the principles and best practices within the framework are proposed to have an impact on business process, client management, and legislative compliance related performance.
The IMF assigns responsibility for information management governance to the Chief Knowledge Officer within the ATO. Primary sources of information within the ATO include: (1) client - general and risk based; (2) tax interpretation; (3) management and administration; and, (4) external stakeholder and other issues. The main indicators for effective information management performance are stated to include: timeliness, accuracy, consistency, accessibility, and promotion of information assets within the ATO.
ICT Performance Assessment
In order to assess the performance of ICT investments, Australian Government agencies are encouraged to use the Demand and Value Assessment Methodologies (DVAM, 2003) and Performance Indicator Resource Catalog (PRIC, 2003) published by AGIMO. The DVAM provide a standard and consistency framework to determine and periodically assess an ICT initiatives net worth against agency value, social value and perceived risk. This framework is said to allow for flows of costs and benefits to be assessed against key stakeholder groups. The PRIC on the other hand provides more of a nomenclature and description of what performance indicators are of important in a government agency context, and how they should be applied and managed to measure the performance of ICT investments. The aim in this case is to provide more traceable links between ICT investments, outputs, results and the agencies strategic intentions (similar structure and intent to the Performance Reference Model - PRM - as part of the US FEA, 2006).
References
AGTIF. (2006) Australian Government Technical Interoperability Framework. Australian Government Information Management Office, http://www.agimo.gov.au [24th September, 2006].
ATO-IMF. (2004) ATO Information Management Framework. ATO Website, http://www.ato.gov.au [24th September, 2006].
ATOHistory. (2006) Australian tax history. ATO Website, http://www.ato.gov.au [24th September, 2006]. D’Ascenzo, M. (2006) ATO Strategic Statement 2006-10. ATO Website, http://www.ato.gov.au [24th September, 2006].
DVAM. (2003) National Office for the Information Economy - 'Measuring E-Government Benefits', presentation at the Key Issues in E-Government seminar, http://www.agimo.gov.au [24th September, 2006].
ECMP03. (2003) The Easier, Cheaper and More Personalised (ECMP) program. ATO Website, http://www.ato.gov.au [24th September, 2006].
FEA. (2006) The Federal Enterprise Architecture. U.S. Office of Management and Budget. http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/egov/a-1-fea.html [24th September, 2006].
GovOSGuide. (2005) Guide for the Adoption of Open Source Software within the Australian Government. Australian Government Information Management Office, http://www.agimo.gov.au [24th September, 2006].
PRIC. (2006) Performance Indicator Resource Catalogue. Australian Government Information Management Office, http://www.agimo.gov.au [24th September, 2006].
Segall, P. Cebalo, M. Jolly, C. Wilson, B. (1994) The “Modernisation?” of the Australian Taxation Office: Issues in Participatory Design in Large Organizations. Information Technology & People 7(3), MCB UP Ltd, pp. 19-36.
SICT. (2006) Secretaries' Committee on ICT. http://www.scict.gov.au [24th September, 2006].