Wardley Maps
for General public administration activities (ISIC 8411)
Critical for addressing the 'Legacy Drag' prevalent in public administration by categorizing which systems are strategic assets versus those that are simply technical debt.
Strategic Overview
Wardley Maps allow public administrators to visualize their technology and service landscape through the lens of evolution. By plotting components from 'Genesis' (bespoke policy experiments) to 'Commodity' (standardized services like cloud infrastructure or identity verification), agencies can make data-driven decisions on when to build proprietary solutions, when to buy off-the-shelf, and when to outsource.
3 strategic insights for this industry
Commoditizing Foundational IT
Many administrative departments treat infrastructure as a proprietary secret, failing to utilize commodity cloud services, which leads to avoidable technical debt.
Strategic Focus on Policy vs. Utility
Maps clarify that policy design is a 'Genesis' or 'Custom' activity that should remain in-house, whereas utility services like payroll or hosting are commodities that should be offloaded.
Prioritized actions for this industry
Decouple Policy from Platform
Ensure digital service platforms are commodity-based to allow for rapid policy iteration without changing underlying tech stacks.
From quick wins to long-term transformation
- Map the current IT stack of a single department
- Identify one 'commodity' service currently being maintained as 'proprietary'
- Establish a 'Buy vs Build' procurement committee
- Standardize modular API requirements for all vendors
- Transition to a component-based infrastructure model across all government agencies
- Misclassifying commodity components as strategic differentiators
- Underestimating the migration cost of legacy integration
Measuring strategic progress
| Metric | Description | Target Benchmark |
|---|---|---|
| Component Evolution Ratio | Ratio of resources spent on 'Commodity' versus 'Custom' components. | Shift 20% of spend toward commodity consumption |
| Vendor Dependency Index | Measures the cost to migrate away from existing proprietary platform providers. | 30% reduction in exit cost |
Other strategy analyses for General public administration activities
Also see: Wardley Maps Framework