Five years of Work4Germany: launch of the fellowship program in 2024

Berlin, 28.08.2024
An anniversary is coming up for one of the major intersections between innovation and administration: The Work4Germany fellowship enters its fifth round today with the start of the introductory days for the 2024 cohort.

Since 2020, Work4Germany has been bringing together experts in transformation and new work from the private sector as “fellows” with employees of the federal administration. Together the tandems work for six months on challenges in the field of digital transformation. The aim: to establish new ways of (collaborative-) work by sustainably empowering employees in the work culture – for a digital culture that is the basis for designing user-centered applications for the state. Organization of the fellowship program is carried out by the DigitalService of the Federal Government as an in-house digitalization unit of the Federal Administration on behalf of the Federal Ministry of the Interior and Community (BMI).

189 applications from experts for new work were reviewed for the current year; on the part of the Federal Administration, 14 projects and teams were selected from around 25 submissions for this year's fellowship. For the first time, the Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture (BMEL), the Institute for Federal Real Estate (BlmA) and the Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing (BAM) are taking part in Work4Germany. Furthermore, the Federal Foreign Office (AA), the Federal Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs (BMAS), the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), the Federal Ministry of Digital and Transport (BMDV), the Federal Ministry of the Interior and Community (BMI), the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action (BMWK) and the German Bundestag are also participating – in some cases with several projects.
The thematic focus of the projects supported this time is on the following areas:

• Digital innovation / Application of new technologies
• Digital management / Modern leadership & new work structures
• Digital administration / Bureaucracy reduction & process renewal
• Digital readiness / Preparation of digital laws

“We are proud that Work4Germany is entering its fifth round this year and has now established itself as a firm building block for method transfer and new ways of working in the federal administration,“ states Christina Lang, co-initiator of Work4Germany and co-founder of DigitalService. “Against the backdrop of staff shortages and budget debates, our fellowship is becoming even more relevant for digital administration. We reach innovators within the administration. Together with the fellows, they ensure that silos are broken down and increase user orientation and effectiveness in specific projects.”

“With this year's project focus and programme design, we want to further strengthen the effective dovetailing of digitalization and work culture through Work4Germany,” says Christian Müller, Program Lead Work4Germany, on the continued development of the fellowship. “The fellows were identified after selecting the administrative projects in order to make the best possible use of the potential of skills and challenges in the assignments. Moreover, we have developed new formats with which we can promote the exchange of federal administration projects in an even more targeted manner and leverage synergies. We are very much looking forward to the results of the working tandems over the next six months!”