A Practical Framework for Digital Service Innovation in the Public Sector: Improving North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) Code Usage to Enable the Convergence of the Public, Private, and Multinational Participant

This research is an exploratory study to identify underlying elements of a practical framework to enable the implementation of digital service innovations in the public sector. Barriers and gaps exist within the public sector digital service ecosystem. This research explores and identifies convergent powers necessary to unify participants with service delivery experience in the public, private, and multinational markets to increase digital services innovations within the public sector. Quantitative methods are applied such as multivariate regression techniques to identify the relationship between variables of interest to public-private partnerships supporting public sector implementation of digital services. Emerging from the regression analysis are relationships among variables relevant to seven categories of influence, extant engineering management practices, and the use of North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) codes. The research used a questionnaire composed of 27 questions scored on a 5-point Likert scale. The questionnaire served as an elicitation tool to quantify the judgment of 47 experts from the public and private sectors on the practicality of a convergent framework for public sector digital service. From the respondents, their collected judgments were used to test two hypotheses: 1) The Convergence of Public, Private, and Multinational sector value chains will increase Digital Service Public Sector Innovation and; 2) Existing Federal government policies for the involvement of diverse enterprises represents a barrier to Digital Service Public Sector Innovation. The study found statistical differences between the public sector and private sector populations' sentiments on 11 of 27 questions about digital service innovation framework. This study aims to provide a framework based on current industry practice and market influences. The proposed framework may provide federal agency managers' insights to improve their resources and remove barriers to implementing innovative digital services in the public sector.