Measuring the effectiveness and performance of e-government portals in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

Abstract

The purposes of this study are to investigate the effectiveness of e-government implementation in Saudi Arabia, explore the underlying factors for the efficient performance of e-government portals, address the gaps and problems that have emerged in e-government portals, examine the impact of the problems found in e-government plan and the needs of its citizens, give the recommendation on the improvement of the performance of e-government portals in order to serve Saudi citizens and its users in the most effective manner. To achieve these purposes, the study used variety of theoretical frameworks namely; model desirability and acceptance of the technology by the citizens, effectiveness, indicative assessment, performance analysis, the obvious benefits and the desirability of its users. The samples of this study are of two types, the first sample cohorts were the experts in information technology and the second samples were the Saudi citizens, who are the portal users. Three instruments were employed in this study namely; the first one was e-government questionnaire adopted from the United Nations administered to the group of experts, the second questionnaire was a developed one administered another group of experts and the third instrument was administered to 300 portal users to measure the portal’s success factors. The findings of the study showed the comparison among the three portals that the Ministry of Interior portal is the most effective one compared to other portals followed by the Safeer’s portal and the Ministry of Labor portal. The experts’ perceptions on the ease of use of the Ministry of Interior portal are not different from the perceptions of users. Almost all the experts and users agreed that the features of the Ministry of Interior portal are well designed in terms of its interface and graphics. In addition to that, the results of this study showed that the portal of the Ministry of Interior is effectively designed and has achieved a high level of system efficiency and performance. However, the study pointed to a decline in the performance of the portal of the Ministry of Labor for ease of use by users and that the site design does not win the overall satisfaction as well. Majority of the experts and citizens are satisfied with the ease of use of the Safeer’s portal followed by the portal of the Ministry of Labor and with the quality of the portal of the Ministry of Interior. Based on this, the study suggests to the government of Saudi Arabia to improve the ease of use of the portal of Safeer for all students and provide the highest level of protection and security to enhance the quality of its performance to be users’ friendly and save their time also for the other portals. The study also recommends the improvement on the high level of performance of portal of the Ministry of Interior even if it is the best in comparison with the other portals.