Government Digital Service hiring two people a day

GDS gives a progress report on its fifth birthday

The Government Digital Service (GDS) has said there is "a lot of work for us to do" in the fewer than 1,000 working days until 2020, as it reflects on its five years in action.

The GDS - responsible for the Digital Marketplace (home of G-Cloud), Gov.UK, Performance Platform, Verify and the Public Services Network - was set up in 2011 with just 14 people on the books.

That figure has now risen past the 700 mark, and it recruits about 45 people a month on average; about two per working day.

Kevin Cunnington became director general of GDS in August, and in a recent blog post outlined how far the service has come.

"GDS remains committed to its original principles: building and supporting services that put the user first. Making things open. Making things better for the citizen," he said.

"Some of the changes we make in people's daily lives are incremental, but they all add up to a big shift in the relationship between citizen and state. GDS is helping to put government at the service of the citizen."

He said there is more work to be done in the new year to digitise the government.

"To make things that are truly better for citizens, we know that we need to fix how data is stored and used in government. Current structures prevent departments giving each other access to information. The creation of joined-up services across government is inhibited by legacy structures. GDS will work to lower these barriers, and help to establish secure, ethical ways for working with data for the benefit of the citizen.

"As digital transformation penetrates every layer of government, working across departments will increasingly become the norm. GDS has invested more into policy and engagement, and is looking at ways for this important work to happen smoothly and efficiently. In modern government, we will need to go beyond siloed services to do the work we need to do ."

Cunnington added that diversity is a key focus for the GDS next year.

"Earlier this year, my predecessor Stephen Foreshew-Cain wrote about the importance of GDS taking part in events such as LGBT+ Pride, and making people from minority groups feel comfortable to be themselves in the workplace. With the support of the GDS Women's Group, we've made a formal commitment to only take part in conferences that are gender diverse. The Women's Group has also been instrumental in rolling out compulsory unconscious bias training for all line managers. We now have a group of about 25 people from the Women's and the recently launched Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) groups who are being trained as unconscious bias facilitators to run the sessions in-house. This means everyone who works at GDS can have consistent face-to-face training. All these things are helping to make GDS a better place to work. One that is better equipped to meet the needs of all its users."

He said he looks to the future "with optimism".

"Although there is no 'finish line' for digital transformation, we can set targets," he said. "There are fewer than 1,000 working days until 2020, and we want to see as many of these objectives realised as we can. That means there is a lot of work for us to do. And there is a lot to be excited about. It won't be easy, and we may not see instant results, but we know that what we're doing is important. A brilliant foundation has been laid. And we're more than ready to take the next steps as we look towards GDS year six, and beyond."