ABSTRACT
This chapter looks briefly at some particular challenges faced by public sector organisations, considering in particular their freedom to act, clarity of purpose, their structures and the ways in which information is, and could be, used. There are four key areas that distinguish public service from private sector organisations in general. The first is that they do not enjoy the same degree of self-determination, their purpose is given to them by government which also controls their budget. Second, the focus of activity often appears to be on output not outcome. Third, with their age and size, to achieve change a lot of organisational inertia has to be overcome. Finally, such organisations are either information driven or information enabled, sometimes both, but government has a long history of less than successful IT projects. Some public services are 'pure' information processers, others use information to drive processes, but all must become Intelligent Organisations.
