Sweden: collaboration and hands-off management
The process of setting up a company in Sweden takes up to eight weeks. There are several steps to navigate, such as obtaining a statement from the bank confirming your share capital, registering with the Companies Registration Office (SCRO) and the tax authority and, depending on the type of business, potentially with the local municipal authority. Each part of the process is conducted via paper and post.
The ambition is that, by the end of 2027, every step will be digitised and the process should take five minutes.
This is just one project of an international collaboration called Nordic Smart Government (NSG) which aims to promote growth and innovation across the Nordic region by connecting consenting private and public sector information systems and making real-time business data accessible to small and medium-sized enterprises.
NSG comprises 16 organisations including the business registries, statistics agencies and tax authorities of Sweden, Norway, Finland, Iceland and Denmark. Since 2016, it has been defining the concept and scope, detailing requirements based on customer needs, and writing the roadmap and implementation plan that was launched in 2021.
This involves extensive consultation with private sector representative bodies and academic researchers. The ultimate aim is that, by 2027, the Nordic countries will be the most integrated region in the world.
Dani Dawoodson Razmgah is chief customer officer at the SCRO, and he says NSG is a great example of Nordic efforts to continually improve and streamline services for citizens and customers.
However, the concept did not come from central government – it is an initiative driven by the participating agencies themselves. Nordic nations are renowned for having cultures that promote social capital and this extends to high levels of empowerment and accountability of employees in all sectors, including the public sector. Razmgah himself worked in a large international private company before joining the SCRO and was shocked by the extent of micromanagement from the company’s European chief, who was British.
“In Sweden, we have a totally different management style. I don’t know how to directly translate it, but we have some kind of trust in each other. They give you the ‘what’ to do, but the ‘how’ to do it is up to you, within a frame of course. But I also know that if I don’t deliver what is expected, I don’t have a job any more.
“If you think about the 80/20 rule that says 80% of the people are doing the right things but 20% are not following the rules or not delivering, then we take the view that instead of checking up on everyone, let’s just check on that 20% instead. And that’s why I think this survey shows that people here are quite happy – it is a good place to work.”