Breaking the uniqueness trap: How regulators can overcome digital transformation challenges

Regulators across Australia and New Zealand pride themselves on their uniqueness. And rightly so—whether they regulate professional disciplines, financial markets, the environment, or public services, their essential value lies in their capacity to deeply understand their domain within a regional context.

While it is important for regulators to preserve their sense of uniqueness in the act of regulating, is it possible the same tendency holds them back in other areas—particularly in digital transformation?

A new paper on effective IT implementation among regulators suggests that might be the case. According to Enabling Digital for Regulators: Lessons from the Front Line, a report by Objective Corporation, regulators may fall victim to “uniqueness bias”—the tendency to see themselves as more singular than they actually are. In IT, this mindset can slow or even prevent much-needed digital initiatives that could improve efficiency, effectiveness, and public protection.

Regulators face many of the same IT challenges

Drawing from interviews with 20 regulatory practitioners and decision-makers and over 50 survey responses from regulatory staff, the report highlights that while regulators do have unique responsibilities, the challenges they face in digital transformation are strikingly similar—both across the regulatory sector and in comparison to other government and corporate organisations.

Many of the barriers regulators encounter, such as governance hurdles, scope creep, and the need to secure executive buy-in, are common across industries. And while certain IT implementations in regulation—particularly core regulatory systems—come with added complexity, regulators share far more in common than they often realise. Recognising this is key to leveraging best practices from similar organisations, rather than reinventing the wheel.

The pitfalls of perceived uniqueness

Whatever the reason for a regulator’s uniqueness bias, in the context of IT implementations, it creates problems.

1. Custom overload: Many regulators believe they need bespoke, highly complex technology solutions. Software vendors often encourage this perception, offering costly, heavily customised systems that lock regulators into rigid, hard-to-maintain technology.
2. Increased risk and costs: A University of Oxford study on uniqueness bias found that projects viewed as "one-of-a-kind" are significantly more likely to experience extreme cost overruns compared to lightly configured, off-the-shelf solutions that have been proven to work elsewhere.
3. Technical debt: Customised IT solutions often lead to long-term maintenance headaches, slow upgrades, limited scalability, and, in worst cases, costly and embarrassing system replacements.

While the uniqueness bias can create significant hurdles in IT implementations generally, the stakes are different—and higher—in a regulatory context.

Regulators share far more in common than they often realise.
Recognising this is key to leveraging best practices from similar organisations.

Getting IT Right

Despite the differences between regulators and other organisations, one thing is clear: regulators across sectors share a common need to get IT implementation right. When public protection is on the line, the risks of failure are too great. That’s why regulators must focus on tried-and-tested success factors rather than allowing uniqueness bias to dictate decisions.

Here are some key IT challenges that regulators face—and how they can overcome them:

• Funding Limitations: Unlike private sector companies, regulators operate under strict budgets and must secure funding through rigorous business cases. The challenge is to balance ambition with realism—overselling a project’s benefits can lead to heavy scrutiny if delivery falls short.
• Tight Timelines: Regulatory IT projects are often tied to policy and legislative changes with hard deadlines. Unlike private companies that can adjust timelines as needed, regulators must work within fixed windows, making project discipline essential. For many regulators, adopting a phased approach with bite-sized changes—rather than attempting large-scale transformations all at once—can help manage risk, secure early wins, and maintain momentum throughout an IT project.
• Bureaucratic Hurdles: Government agencies, including regulators, face slow decision-making due to hierarchical structures and red tape. Streamlining governance and empowering project teams can help mitigate these delays.
• Staffing Constraints: Government pay limitations make it difficult to attract and retain IT talent. Smart resourcing strategies, including backfilling roles and leveraging external expertise, can help bridge the gap.
• High Stakes: A failed IT project in regulation doesn’t just impact internal operations—it can erode public trust and damage reputations at the highest levels of government.

The common path to success

Despite these challenges, regulators have a significant advantage: the same success factors that drive digital transformation in other organisations also apply to them. These include:

• Spending more time on upfront planning, securing funding, and defining clear business goals.
• Building contingency planning into the project from the start.
• Ensuring proper resourcing, including backfilling roles if needed.
• Prioritising change management and securing the necessary support and resources early on.
• Maintaining strong governance throughout to prevent scope creep and ensure project goals are met.

Regulators don’t need to navigate digital transformation alone or create entirely unique solutions for every challenge they face. By recognising the commonalities across regulatory bodies and beyond, they can leverage existing best practices and proven strategies to drive more effective IT implementations.

That’s just a high-level overview of some of the principles regulators can use to achieve success in any IT implementation. To go deeper on these success factors and for additional insights on effective IT implementation, download the full report.