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Case management key as more households turn to government services

Tara Charles
September 13, 2014

Effective case management solutions play a vital role in enabling government organizations to handle the specific cases of individuals and households who are accessing various public services. Case management software could prove integral moving forward as the government is facing a growing number of people accessing various services. The U.S. Census Bureau recently released the results of a 2012 study on the number of households accessing government assistance in some way and the results pointed to considerable challenges for agencies.

According to the study, the number of households that had accessed public assistance benefits within the past 12 months was 3.3 million in 2012. This represented 2.9 percent of the population. This represented a significant increase compared to the year 2000, when 2.7 million households, 2.6 percent of the population, used the same type of services within the past 12 months. Case management is all about helping organizations deal with the individual cases - in this case people and households - and BPM case management solutions are becoming key as the government needs to handle a larger number of households.

Considering the value of BPM case management

Process and case management are closely aligned. Business process management software helps organizations standardize how workers will get the job done, automate repeatable processes and ensure that operations flow smoothly between stakeholders on a project. BPM case management solutions apply those principles to case management ensuring that all of the processes surrounding a case are handled effectively. This is particularly important in government as a single case may have a variety of individuals in different departments and agencies working together to meet a citizen's needs.

Passing cases between users is incredibly important for government organizations working to maximize efficiency, especially as more agencies work to integrate cloud applications and mobile devices into their day-to-day operations. Furthermore, government agencies are facing mounting pressure to get more done in terms of assisting citizens while spending less. The end result is an environment in which process optimization within case management is critical.

With federal agencies being tasked with maximizing operational efficiency while transitioning to electronic records management principles, there is a growing need for solutions that help organizations within the public sector improve day-to-day processes. Case management solutions that are founded in BPM software packages provide the functionality that government agencies need to deal with population growth and increased demand for government services without taking on costs that don't deliver value in turn.