Digital workforce data and evidence
Information about the public service digital workforce, the wider technology sector in New Zealand and what overseas jurisdictions are doing.
Public service digital workforce
The Public Service Commission (PSC) reports on public service workforce data on a quarterly basis, with occupational data collected annually each June.
At , the equivalent of 63,537 full-time public servants worked in New Zealand across a wide range of occupations at departments and departmental agencies.
There was strong growth (34%) in the public service workforce between and
Digital technology specialists and digital leaders
Public Service Commission workforce occupation data provides information about the occupational profiles of the public service workforce and staff numbers. This includes some data about digital technology specialists and digital leaders.
The best proxy we have for digital leaders is the ‘ICT Managers’ occupation group. In , the 520 ‘ICT Managers’ included 17 CIOs and 280 ICT Managers working in departments and departmental agencies (less than 1% of the public service workforce).
The best proxy in the Commission’s occupation data for digital technology specialists is the occupation group ‘ICT Professionals and Technicians’. In , 2,577 people in the public service workforce were ‘ICT Professionals and Technicians’. In , 34% of this group were women, 7.4% were Māori and 4.2% were Pacific Peoples. This compares to the whole of the public service workforce, where 62% were women, 16.7% were Māori and 11% were Pacific Peoples.
Between and , the number of ICT Professionals and Technicians grew by 45% — from 1,772 in (3.8% of the public service workforce) to 2,577 in (4.1%). The numbers are growing at a faster rate than the public service overall. There are significant percentage increases in some occupations, which are likely to reflect demand from:
- the growth of cloud computing
- cybersecurity threats
- improving agency efficiency and productivity.
Occupations where number have increased include:
- web developers — up 44% from 27 to 39
- software engineers — up 162% from 55 to 144
- ICT security specialists — up 324% from 41 to 174
- ICT business analysts — up 41% from 322 to 453.
Note: These percentages are calculated using rounded numbers.
Workforce Data - Occupation — Te Kawa Mataaho | Public Service Commission
Challenges with workforce data
A single view of the public service digital workforce cannot yet be formed because comparability between data sets is limited. Improving data about the digital workforce is a priority.
Insights from a survey of public service and state sector agencies
In , the Government Chief Digital Officer (GCDO) surveyed digital technology specialists and digital leaders from 51 public service and state sector agencies. They were asked about the capability of their digital workforces. 31 agencies responded.
‘Understanding the digital workforce capability of public service agencies’ is the first survey to examine the capability of the public service workforce.
The survey included questions about:
- the capability of agencies’ digital workforce
- the way agencies assess and develop capability, including agencies’ use of skills frameworks and strategic workforce planning
- challenges building capability.
Current digital workforce capability is varied
More than half (55%) of responding agencies rated their capability as ‘meeting expectations’. A third (32%) of responding agencies rated their capability as ‘needing improvement’ and 13% rated their capability as ‘exceeding expectations’ or being ‘outstanding’.
Agencies are assessing and developing capability using a small core set of tools
Assessing capability
Responding agencies mainly use Professional Development Plans (PDPs) and manager evaluations to assess their digital workforce capability.
About 35% of respondents saw PDPs and manager evaluations as very useful. About 75% of responding agencies also find self-assessments ‘useful’ to ‘very useful’. This is closely followed by peer feedback and customer satisfaction levels with about 60% of agencies finding them ‘useful’ to ‘very useful’ as well.
Responses were more mixed about tools like the skills assessments, KPIs, or assessment against a capability or skills framework.
Developing capability
Agencies reported using a core set of well-known tools and methods to develop the capability of their digital workforce. All agencies used on-the-job learning (100%), which most combined with learning and development (87%), performance development (78%) and communities of practice/interest (71%).
As well as this core set of tools and methods, agencies use a mixture of approaches to target and tailor capability uplift and development approaches.
- about 50% of agencies also use public service capability frameworks — such as Te Arawhiti or the Leadership Success Profile (LSP) frameworks, succession planning, or in-house capability frameworks
- just under 40% of agencies use formal or informal Continuing Professional Development (CPD), strategic workforce planning or graduate programmes.
Agencies were clear about the need to develop capability but were pragmatic regarding the time and funding required.
I’d suggest that all agencies need to have a plan to develop digital workforce capability and we could do better on this front. Organisations need to focus on getting more familiar with technologies that improve services to citizens and workforce capability must be in step with that in order for it to happen.
Responding agencies identified the following main issues and challenges relating to the development of their digital workforce capability:
- scarce skills — a shortage of candidates with the required digital skills (48% of agencies)
- finding skills is challenging, for example, agencies talked about issues with how and where to secure candidates with the digital skills needed (45% of agencies)
- developing skills in the digital workforce, for example, issues in upskilling and reskilling workforce to fill skills gaps (39% of agencies)
- lack of resources and/or funding (39% of agencies), with some agencies specifically calling out the ability to compete with salaries from the private sector
- lack of time (29% of agencies)
- difficulty to predict the future requirements for digital skills (29% of agencies).
One agency reported that the sourcing issue had eased in the last 12 months ( to ).
This has changed quite a bit in the last 12 months. Given the cost and efficiency streams, we are finding it easier to identify some great talent in the market which is enabling us to achieve a better contractor to permanent ratio. Some skills like cyber are still difficult to find, but we are developing plans for this.
Using skills or capability frameworks
The survey also asked questions about agencies’ use of skills or capability frameworks.
Most agencies talked about the benefits of using frameworks to:
- recruit talent more effectively through job and role design
- identify and close capability gaps more efficiently
- better evaluate individual performance
- support professional development and progression, including providing more personalised professional development, creating career pathways within and across teams and departments and understand and unlock leadership potential
- help act on strategic succession and workforce plans.
The Skills Framework for the Information Age (SFIA)
The survey asked a set of questions specifically about the use of SFIA.
6 responding agencies use SFIA (20%), which is half the agencies that reported using a skills or capability framework. More than half of participating agencies, 17 out of 31, were aware of the New Zealand SFIA Whole-of-Country licence.
No clear pattern emerged in agencies’ responses regarding the way they use SFIA. Among the agencies that use SFIA, all reported using SFIA for variable tasks, including:
- planning and organising the digital workforce and its capability
- acquiring the digital workforce and its capability
- deploying the digital workforce and its capability
- analysing and assessing the digital workforce and its capability
- identifying capabilities for digital skills and knowledge development
- rewarding/recognising the digital workforce and its capability.
Most or all agencies using SFIA agree that SFIA is easy to use, is fit for purpose, and helps:
- effectively support workforce planning for the digital workforce
- reduce the need for other frameworks
- identify existing skills, skills assessments and skill gaps
- make job descriptions clear and fit for purpose
- improve digital workforce recruitment and development.
Respondents identified no major challenges using SFIA, but a recurring theme was the need for a better and wider understanding of SFIA by both the recruitment profession and public service agencies.
Challenges
Agencies identified 2 main challenges to their capability:
- skills shortages and finding people with the right skills, including the need to upskill their digital workforce (such as AI-related skills)
- a lack of capacity to develop capability.
- “Current resources are fully committed, which limits our ability to increase capacity.”
- “With the AI shift — we need to rescope and invest in new capacity.”
- “Now need to reskill the majority of our workforce to operate in the ... AI space.”
Competing for people in a competitive market
We largely use capability frameworks across our practice. In the case of our OpSec (operations security) team, with a competitive market for these roles we have made a conscious decision to grow the talent ourselves and apply a revolving door policy as people decide to move on. Having clear capability frameworks allow us to take a more strategic approach and also provide people with clear development pathways.
Lack of capacity
Consistency and impact. Often dependent on the passion and experience of the capability lead or senior leaders. There is a genuine desire across the majority of the workforce to learn and adopt new skills and technologies — often a ‘bandwidth’ issue, where we can only progress so many things concurrently.
Having capability frameworks in place is useful in terms of helping to grow and develop our skillsets and align to emerging trends and future-focused ways of working (ICT specific). The main challenge is finding dedicated time to apply them in a consistent and ongoing way, due to other competing work priorities.
The wider digital workforce in New Zealand
New Zealand’s public service digital workforce sits alongside a wider digital workforce. This includes:
- the New Zealand digital technology sector
- digital workers in other sectors
- digital skills in all jobs.
The Workforce Development Council’s image is useful, particularly in its definition of ‘advanced digital skills’ which is similar to the term ‘digital technology specialists’ used in this information and guidance.
Detailed description of the image
The pyramid is divided into 4 segments:
- Smallest segment — Digital technology workforce Industries
- Second smallest — Digital workers other industries
- Second largest — Digital skills in all jobs
- Largest segment — Digital skills total population.
Investment in the digital workforce
The Workforce Development Council’s 2024 research found:
- government investment in technology education has declined, while there is increasing demand in the digital technology industry for more skilled workers
- we have a domestic workforce shortage that is unable to meet the skills and labour needs of the growing digital technology sector.
The New Zealand technology sector key metrics
NZTech’s report noted the continued growth of the New Zealand technology sector, driving job creation and boosting valuable exports.
ICT professionals are in demand across the economy, not just the tech sector. In , there were 98,290 ICT professionals working across all sectors, including the tech sector. This was a 3.4% increase year on year, or 3220 new ICT jobs. Most of these jobs are computer programmers or software engineers (33,250) followed by ICT managers — project and product managers (14,100). The fastest growth is in website design and developer jobs.
The New Zealand tech sector key metrics 2023 (pg. 11) — NZ Tech
Labour Market Statistics Snapshot
This snapshot presents key statistics on employment, underutilisation, labour force participation and NEET Youth (Not in Employment, Education or Training). MBIE produces these snapshots after each new release of the Labour Market Statistics, published by Stats NZ every February, May, August and November.
Labour Market Statistics Snapshot — Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment
National Occupational List (NOL)
The NOL is a New Zealand-focused occupation classification. The NOL enables us to add new and emerging occupations to meet user demand and need and better reflect New Zealand’s labour market and economy.
NOL maintains alignment with Australia and other countries to ensure comparability across the New Zealand, Australia and international labour markets and economies.
Stats NZ is responsible for the ongoing maintenance of the NOL, and for managing the stakeholder and user expectations for keeping the list up to date.
About the National Occupational List — Stats NZ
What other jurisdictions are doing
Australian Public Service (APS) strategy and planning
APS has released both a Data and Digital Strategy and a Data, Digital and Cyber Workforce plan
Data and Digital Government Strategy — Digital Transformation Agency
APS Data, Digital and Cyber Workforce Plan 2025-30 (PDF 5.3MB)
The APS strategy vision is to:
- deliver simple, secure and connected public services through world-class data and digital capabilities by
- improve APS data and digital skills and whole-of-government policies and frameworks to support the APS to safely engage with new data and digital technologies.
The APS workforce plan provides a coordinated approach to:
- attract top data, digital and cyber talent, streamline recruitment processes and position APS as a modern employer in a challenging labour market
- ensure long-term data, digital and cyber workforce capability by providing career pathways and mobility opportunities, investing in continuous skill development and strengthening in-house expertise
- address the immediate need for critical data, digital and cyber specialists, recognising these capabilities are difficult to source and take time to grow
- enhance capability planning maturity by using data-driven insights and ensuring access to high-quality data, empowering agencies to make informed workforce decisions.
Skills-first approach
The Australian Public Service is adopting a skills-first approach, moving away from roles-based forecasting.
In-demand skills — Data and Digital
There are advantages to focusing on skills including because the proliferation of job titles makes understanding the workforce skills challenging. Using skills frameworks like SFIA can support skills mapping and help you understand skills demand and shortages. The approach could help identify transferable skills and enable better utilisation of the existing workforce.
Skills frameworks like SFIA strengthen the ability of the digital public service workforce to deliver results.
Both Canada and the United Kingdom have similar digital strategies which have a focus on attracting, developing and retaining the public service digital workforce, to provide modern digital services that meet the needs of citizens.
2023 Report on the state of the Digital Decade — European Commission
Utility links and page information
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