Nugroho Arief Prasetyo, Policy Analyst, Ministry of Administrative and Bureaucratic Reform, Indonesia

1) What does public service mean to you? Can you share more about your role in the public sector? 

Public service, to me, begins with a simple discomfort: the awareness that government can feel far away from the people it is meant to serve. A citizen should not have to understand institutional boundaries to receive help. A family should not have to repeat the same information to different offices. A person should not feel lost in a system that was created in their name. That is why I see public service as the patient work of shortening the distance between the state and its citizens. 

I serve at Indonesia’s Ministry of Administrative and Bureaucratic Reform, in the Deputy for Government Digital Transformation. My role supports policy formulation, inter-agency coordination, international cooperation, and the development of frameworks that help digital government become more integrated, accountable, and citizen-centred. 

I am only a small part of a much larger effort. But I am grateful to contribute to work that asks an important question: how can government become not only more digital, but also more human? 

For me, public service is not about being at the centre of reform. It is about helping the system move closer to the people.  

2) Tell us about a project you championed. What impact did it have on the community? 

One contribution I value deeply is being part of the effort to shift how Indonesia measures digital government. For many years, government transformation was often assessed through documents, systems, and compliance. Those foundations are important. But they do not always answer the question citizens care about most: Has government become easier to access, simpler to use, and more worthy of trust? 

Through our Ministry’s reform agenda, I was grateful to support the development of Indonesia’s new Digital Government Index. The instrument moves from 47 compliance-heavy indicators to 20 more outcome-oriented indicators. It gives greater attention to data governance, cybersecurity, digital technology, service integration, and citizen satisfaction, which carries the largest weight at 25 per cent. 

This shift matters because measurement shapes institutional behaviour. At the same time, openness, participation, and accountability are being brought closer into the way digital government is assessed. Open government should not remain only a promise, a speech, or a movement. It must become part of the standard by which institutions are evaluated. 

The Index will be applied to more than 640 ministries, agencies, and local governments across Indonesia. That means the impact is not only administrative. It is institutional. It helps move openness from advocacy to accountability, from aspiration to assessment, from being encouraged to being expected. 

I am humbled to be part of that journey. 

Because openness is not enough to be declared. It must be measured. And when openness enters evaluation, it begins to enter the way institutions work. 

3) As a young professional, how has your unique background or perspective allowed you to identify a solution that others in your organisations might have overlooked? 

Before joining public service, I worked as a journalist. Journalism taught me to listen beyond official language. It taught me that every policy has two lives: one in government documents, and another in the daily experience of citizens. 

Later, studying eGovernment and Public Management in Yonsei University, Korea helped me understand that technology is never the whole answer. The strongest digital governments are built not only through platforms, but through trust, institutions, coordination, discipline, and humility. 

Those experiences shaped the way I see reform. 

I try to look at digital transformation from both sides: from the institution that designs it, and from the citizen who must live with it. Sometimes the overlooked question is not, “How can we digitise this process?” It is, “Why is this process still a burden?” 

That question matters. Because public innovation should not be measured only by what government creates, but also by what burdens government is brave enough to eliminate. 

4) What is your personal strategy for maintaining your creative energy when faced with bureaucracy? 

I try to remain patient without becoming passive. Bureaucracy can be slow. But slowness is not always emptiness. Behind every procedure are people, responsibilities, risks, and histories that must be understood before they can be improved.

My strategy is to keep learning. When I face complexity, I read. I listen. I ask questions. I speak with colleagues. I learn from other governments. I return to the citizen’s perspective. 

Creativity in government is rarely loud. It is often the quiet discipline of finding a better path without breaking the trust that institutions are meant to protect. Bureaucracy should not kill creativity. It should refine it into patience, evidence, and responsibility. 

5) If you had just one area to invest in to accelerate transformation in the public sector, which one would you choose and why? 

I would invest in how government measures success. Because institutions improve what they measure. 

If success is measured by the number of systems built, government will build more systems. If success is measured by documents produced, government will produce more documents. But if success is measured by whether citizens are served more easily, whether agencies collaborate more effectively, and whether people trust government more deeply, then institutions begin to organise themselves around public value. 

Technology is important. Talent is important. Regulation is important. But measurement quietly shapes all of them. In many ways, the indicators we choose become the direction we take. They tell institutions what matters, what is rewarded, and what must improve. 

That is why I believe measurement is not a technical exercise. It is one of the most powerful instruments of reform. 

6) What is your greatest ambition as you grow in your public service career? 

My greatest ambition is to remain useful to the work. Not to be remembered as the person behind a reform, but to be part of reforms that help citizens experience government with more ease, dignity, and trust.

I hope to keep contributing to institutions that are more open, more integrated, and more humane. Institutions where citizens do not need to understand the complexity of government just to access their rights. Institutions where digital transformation does not make public service feel colder, but closer. 

If the systems we help build today can serve people better tomorrow, even when our names are no longer attached to them, that would be a meaningful legacy. 

Public service, at its best, is not about leaving our signature. It is about leaving better institutions behind. 

7) What is a “universal value” that connects everyone in your ministry – from interns to directors – and how do you use that to drive collaboration? 

The universal value is dignity. As I often hear from our Minister, Ibu Rini Widyantini, public service must be delivered with dignity. Citizens should not only be served quickly; they should be served respectfully. 

That message has stayed with me. 

Every person who comes into contact with government carries dignity: the citizen waiting for a service, the officer handling difficult coordination, the intern preparing notes, and the director carrying institutional responsibility. Digital transformation should protect and strengthen that dignity. In our department, roles may differ, but the purpose is shared: to help government serve people better. 

When collaboration becomes complicated, I try to return to one simple question: Will this help citizens be served with more dignity? 

That question brings people back to purpose. It reminds us that coordination is not merely administrative. It is moral work, because behind every system are people waiting to be served.  

8) What is the best piece of advice you’ve got for the next generation of public servants? 

Do not enter public service only to be seen. Enter it to serve what is often unseen. 

Much of government work happens quietly: a better policy note, a clearer regulation, a careful coordination meeting, a sentence revised so it protects more people, a question asked so a decision becomes fairer. 

These small acts may not receive applause. But they matter. Be humble enough to learn from those before you. Be brave enough to ask better questions. Be patient enough to understand the system. And be principled enough not to lose your sense of purpose inside it. 

Public service will test your idealism. Let it mature you, but never let it make you indifferent.  

9) What is a myth you wish to debunk about young public servants? 

The myth is that young public servants only bring ambition. Many bring something quieter, but just as important: sincerity. 

They may not have decades of experience, but they often carry a deep willingness to learn, to contribute, and to help institutions respond to a changing society. 

Being young does not mean dismissing the past. It means having the energy to honour what works, question what no longer serves, and help prepare government for the future. 

Young public servants do not need to pretend to have all the answers. 

Sometimes their contribution is more modest, but still valuable: to ask honest questions, to connect new ideas, and to remind institutions that citizens’ expectations are changing.  

10) Write a letter to your future self in 2035

Dear future Nunu (my nickname), 

I hope you are healthy. I hope you are kinder to yourself now. I hope you still remember the younger version of you who kept trying, even when the days were long and the nights were longer. I hope you have remained faithful to the reason you chose public service. 

I hope responsibility has made you wiser, but not distant. I hope experience has made you calmer, but not indifferent. I hope recognition, if it ever came, did not make you forget the quiet dignity of the work. Remember that government is not an abstract machine. It is a promise made to people. 

I hope the work you were once part of helped institutions become more open, more trusted, and more humane. And if your name is no longer remembered, let that be enough. The best reforms are not always the ones that carry our names, but the ones that continue serving people after we have moved on. 

Keep listening before deciding. Keep learning before leading. Keep serving before seeking to be seen. And when the work feels slow, remember the nights you stayed late, the drafts you rewrote, the meetings you prepared for, and the small hopes you quietly carried into the office each day. Be proud of yourself, not because you changed everything, but because you kept showing up. 

You served with sincerity. You learned with humility. You tried, even when no one was watching. And that, too, is public service. 

With gratitude, and quietly proud of the person you chose to become,

Your younger self.