Get Started with Public Sector Solutions

Learning Objectives

After completing this unit, you’ll be able to:

• List some common challenges that public sector authorities face.
• Describe the benefits of using Public Sector Solutions.
• Outline the five broad phases of any authorization process.

Welcome to the Public Sector World

In this module, we focus on the Licensing and Permitting Management, and Inspections Management application features in Public Sector Solutions. We don’t cover the capabilities of Emergency Response Management (ERM) for Public Sector in this module. To learn more about ERM capabilities, check out the Emergency Response Management for Public Sector guide.

What do opening a spa, getting your driver’s license, applying for a parking permit, and preparing for a restaurant inspection have in common? All of these processes are governed by various regulations that require you to follow specific steps and procedures. They also share a tendency to be frustrating experiences. Whether due to a lack of visibility into where you are in the process, a confusing mix of interfaces and forms, or unclear instructions, most of us have struggled at some point to get a license, permit, or to deal with inspections and violations. 

Now imagine what it feels like to be on the other side of the counter. Whether it's citizen outreach, or issuing and renewing licenses and permits, as a public official you are likely challenged by cumbersome processes.

In the modern digital landscape of online applications, customer self-service, and automated workflows, government authorities and public offices must rethink and reinvent their task flows. The ultimate goal for any public sector authority is to increase constituent engagement and streamline internal workflows. Public Sector Solutions from Salesforce does just that.

The Key Challenges

Let’s break down the key issues and challenges that citizens and public officials face.

• Inconsistent presentation of information: A business owner or constituent who wants to find information needs to access multiple websites. They lose valuable time navigating and understanding the requirements, prerequisites, processes, and timelines for different permits and licenses. Ideally, they want a list of all licenses, permits, and dependent permits that they require based on their business type. And they want to be able to track the different applications, upload the relevant documents, and manage their authorizations from a single place.
• Lack of visibility into timing and processes: Once an applicant fills out forms and initiates the process, there’s little visibility into the granular details such as timeframes for each stage, status of each license and permit, and next steps. Very often, a few intermediate steps happen offline and are not digitally interactive, which leads to confusion and delay.
  Meanwhile, compliance and enforcement officials want an easy way to consolidate all the disparate sources of information. There are a lot of details related to a single applicant, such as account details, related applications, dependent licenses and permits, inspection visit details, violation details, enforcement actions information, and complaint details. Officials want to manage everything from a single console to reduce their turnaround time for iterative issues and to improve collaboration across departments.
• Manual processes and lack of coordination: With the involvement of multiple officials and departments, there’s a lack of cohesion between processes. Enforcement and compliance officers depend on reviewers, multiple approvers, and inspectors to fill them in on critical updates before they can issue or renew licenses and applications. Reviewers and approvers want a unified view of information related to any applicant. They want to simplify the process of coordinating reviews and approvals and sending notifications to the various parties involved.
• Disconnected systems and redundant paperwork for inspections: Inspectors in the field lose valuable time in planning visits, manually integrating their notes into back-office systems, and recording inputs in different forms. There’s no easy way to associate pictures and videos captured during inspections with predefined regulatory codes and violations. They need a mobile application to simplify these tasks—one that would let them view all regulatory codes specific to the business they are inspecting, check out license and permit details, capture their findings, take photos, and assess violations with a few simple clicks. That type of app would reduce errors and save valuable time with minimal post-inspection follow-up work.
• Inadequate risk analysis to reduce bottlenecks: Public sector executives do not have adequate insights into customer engagement and application processes to make data-driven decisions. They struggle to track and analyze trends and outcomes to form a well-informed opinion on how to bridge the gap between citizens and the government.

Public Sector Solutions removes bureaucratic red tape by increasing collaboration across government departments and breaking up silos of data. The solutions provide citizens an easy-to-use web portal where they can find the right information at the right time. Using the web portal, prospective business owners and applicants can easily understand the various processes involved and track the status of their licenses and permits, inspection results, and enforcement actions.

Public Sector Solutions can help you simplify any government authorization process at the city, state, and even federal level. These Salesforce solutions have you covered for any scenario, whether it’s an authorization from a city government or one that must be managed by state or federal agencies.

The Five Stages of Authorization

Public Sector Solutions can help government agencies through the five broad stages of any constituent-government interaction journey.

• Citizen outreach
• Intake of applications
• Reviewing and approving of licenses and permits
• Inspections of businesses and facilities or assessments of individuals
• Issuance and renewal based on violations and enforcement actions

Next, you will see two of the key features of Public Sector Solutions, specifically the License and Permit Management app and the Inspections Management app, in action.