MoU between the Italian Civil Service and TIM to spread digital skills in the public sector

Spread IT capabilities within the public sector to accelerate the digital transformation of the Italian public administration: today the Italian Minister for Public Administration, Fabiana Dadone, and the CEO of TIM, Luigi Gubitosi, signed a three-year memorandum of understanding (MoU) aimed at simplifying the processes of the public administration, making it more accessible to citizens and bringing it into line with Italian businesses.

The agreement comes 100 days after the launch of "Operazione Risorgimento Digitale" - the initiative promoted by TIM and the partners who have joined the telco in encouraging digital inclusion throughout the country, hosting internet schools in 107 municipalities. This partnership consolidates the ongoing efforts by the Ministry’s Civil Service Department and TIM to support the digital training of civil servants as part of the Open Government strategies to foster a truly participatory democracy.      

Specifically, TIM will provide training for the PA employees, both in the classroom and e-learning and through all the initiatives of Operazione Risorgimento Digitale. TIM's travelling digital education project will see over 400 educators provide more than 20 thousand hours of tutorials in all 107 Italian provinces by the end of this year, reaching a million citizens as well as SMEs and civil servants. The project already involved PA employees from 9 different provinces in Sicily – where the initiative was launched – and is ongoing through 5 provinces in Calabria, through workshops and classroom-based training delivered together with local authorities and associations.

The Civil Service Department will encourage participation by providing the tools it has developed to assess the know-how of its personnel, based on the 'Syllabus' that sets out the digital skills and abilities required to work in the civil service.

Fabiana Dadone, the Minister for Public Administration, said: “This important agreement enables us to boost the computing and ICT capabilities that public employees need. I am therefore grateful to TIM and all the other partners who are taking on this crucial challenge for the national economy. Working methods and organisation are changing, but above all the cultural approach is evolving. We have to encourage a shift from a compliance-based logic to one based on outcomes and citizen satisfaction. Technology plays a decisive role in this revolution. We are trying, deliberately, to bring young people into the heart of the State, but continuous training of those already working in the public sector remains a key part of our strategy.”

Luigi Gubitosi, Chief Executive Officer of TIM, said: “With this agreement we further strengthen our collaboration with the Civil Service to support digital training in the public administration – locally and centrally - facilitating the digital transformation of the 22,000 local bodies that depend on the Civil Service. We want to work alongside the public administration to modernise its contact points with citizens, which is a key pivot-point for the digitalisation process in all of Italy. This initiative will be rolled out to other ministries soon. Civil servants in Sicily’s 9 provinces have already been trained through ‘Operazione Risorgimento Digitale’, our project that will soon be joined by new partners and is continuing in the five provinces of Calabria. The training programme for public employees will be delivered through classroom-based and e-learning courses, with content based on joint work on the Syllabus, the Civil Service Department's manual for building the digital skills of professionals whose work brings them into contact with citizens.”