Factors influencing E-government progress in Oman: An employees' perspective

While most early e-government efforts were concentrated on developed countries, in the recent past, it has also become popular in many developing countries. Most notably are the Middle Eastern countries that have continued to invest significantly into e-government initiatives in the last five years. However, compared to the West, the progress of e-government implementation and diffusion has been laggard in the Middle East region. The Sultanate of Oman is one such example, where, although large investments have been made since 2003 to facilitate the implementation of electronic services in the public sector, only limited progress has been made in terms of realising fully functional e-government. The aim of this paper is to identify the factors that are currently influencing the development and implementation of e-government in Oman using a quantitative survey-based empirical study in three key public service agencies. The research identified thirteen different factors that were influencing the progress of the national e-government project, e-Oman, from the viewpoint of government employees. The most salient of these factors were the Omani IT workforce capability and the citizens' trust and confidence in using e-services.