Virtual public administration: improving public administration procedures through project management
The best way to contribute electronic and mobile Government is by creating a public administration network in virtual communities. This is essentially the definition of Virtual Public Administration (VPA) A virtual community (a good example of which would be the well acclaimed virtual reality world Second Life) could potentially provide the platform to offer improved public administration services. Arguably, the quality of these services to citizens and businesses in virtual communities are more competitive than in reality. Therefore, the social, economic and technological impact is more inquiring because we could potentially offer to the end users more motivation to join these communities. Furthermore the success of the VPA is based on the virtual project management application. Our paper examines, theoretically and empirically, how VPA could potentially contribute to better public administration services and how effective project management application could facilitate the proposed transition. The research strategy is based on a combination of qualitative and quantitative methodological approaches. In that respect pertinent data is been collected through both semi structured interviews and questionnaires, with executives and others, in the Greek and UK public administration sector. Preliminary theoretical results demonstrate the improvement achieved by integrating time in virtual and real worlds and by testing impact to the quality of service provided by public sector to citizens/businesses. To that end, our study provides both qualitative (statements of directors, observations) and quantitative (metrics) examples related to these improvements. Three UK based councils have agreed in principle to participate to the study. Furthermore, in Greece the General Inspector of Public Administration, the National University of Athens and others has also agreed to participate. Our paper concludes with the contribution of our work along with some interesting avenues for further research.