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Department for Work and Pensions Case Study

Intelligent Workflow Transformation and governed access at scale, powered by DXP

Project overview

Bringing a distributed government workforce onto one governed, AI-ready platform

The Department for Work and Pensions, the UK’s largest government department by workforce with 93,976 staff and contractors (GOV.UK workforce data, May 2026), runs its digital workplace on Invotra’s DXP.

When demand across the benefits system rises sharply, DWP needs to bring colleagues in from other government departments fast, without weakening control over who can see what.

Rather than commissioning a new system for that, DWP’s digital team works with us through Intelligent Workflow Transformation, engaging DWP’s core digital team and partner organisations including the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), to map exactly which access, publishing and identity journeys need to flex under pressure.

DXP’s distributed publishing, secure targeting and identity integration capabilities deliver it, extending one governed platform rather than standing up a second one.

The challenges

A rapid capability review, run through Intelligent Workflow Transformation, identifies exactly what stands between DWP and safely extending its platform to colleagues across other government departments, including HSE, under real operational pressure.

1. Rapid, large-scale demand

  • A 10-fold surge in demand has previously pushed 1.8 million Universal Credit claims through in a single week

  • Colleagues need to be redeployed from 10 other government departments, including HSE, within days, not months

  • No new platform can be procured or built while demand is live

2. Governing access without an all-or-nothing switch

  • Older approaches can only grant or deny access at an organisation level, with no way to scope by content area, team or grade

  • Sensitive DWP-only guidance risks exposure to partner departments without granular control

  • A central team needs to retain full editorial oversight while extending access to thousands of new users

3. Four identity systems, one platform to secure

  • Partner departments, including HSE, each run their own instance of Azure Active Directory

  • Manually provisioning and managing credentials for thousands of external staff would take months of IT resource

  • Every new joiner needs working access and a populated profile from day one, not week three

4. Keeping a distributed workforce informed and compliant

  • Redeployed staff need to see fast-changing policy and procedural guidance immediately

  • Without a way to confirm staff have actually seen and understood critical updates, compliance gaps open up fast

  • A single, undifferentiated newsfeed risks burying the specific information each person needs

Designing services around user needs 

Intelligent Workflow Transformation redesigns the access and publishing journeys; DXP’s distributed publishing, secure targeting and identity integration deliver them, extending one governed platform to thousands of new users.

1. Extending the platform, not duplicating it

  • DXP’s distributed publishing capability brings 10 government departments, including HSE, and 3,000 external colleagues onto the existing platform within days

  • No new platform needs to be procured, built or licensed for this kind of response

  • Central publishing governance stays intact throughout, with no loss of editorial control

2. Governing access by organisation, team and grade

  • DXP’s secure targeting feature controls exactly which locations, teams, grades and line managers see specific guidance

  • Content publishing workflows let the central team create and target information at specific third-party organisations, such as HSE, within the same system

  • Structured feedback and access-request workflows let partner organisations request additional access or content directly through the platform, replacing ad hoc email requests

3. One platform, four identity systems, single sign-on

  • Four separate Azure Active Directory instances, including HSE’s, integrate securely so every partner organisation connects without DWP creating or managing duplicate credentials

  • New starters get working access and an automatically populated profile from day one

  • Access can be reviewed, scoped or withdrawn centrally at any time, by organisation

4. Keeping people informed, compliant and heard

  • DXP’s read-and-receipt feature means staff actively acknowledge critical updates, such as policy changes, before continuing

  • Automated publishing schedules changes and future-dated updates without manual intervention

  • Personalised newsfeeds and notifications mean each person sees only what’s relevant to them, and is alerted when it changes

  • Pre- and post-moderated review workflows keep comments and feedback open without losing control

Proven impact  

  • 3,000+ external colleagues and 10 government departments, including HSE, onboard onto one governed platform, with no new system procured or built
  • 4 separate Azure AD instances integrate securely into a single centralised platform
  • Access is governed by organisation, team and grade throughout, with full central editorial oversight retained
  • A governed platform relationship that has run continuously since 2015
  • Delivered under Invotra's ISO 27001, ISO 9001 and ISO 42001 certified management systems
Invotra's Intranet on laptop and phone

 

The economics of reuse 

£200,000

The estimated cost avoided by extending an existing governed platform rather than building a comparable enterprise intranet from scratch.

£40 million

Saved by DWP in a single year through adopting a shared identity solution instead of building its own.

 

 

£41 million

The estimated yearly value of reducing time spent finding information by just five minutes a day across a workforce of DWP’s scale.

(Indicative figures, not measured savings for this specific project)

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star ratings

Being able to utilise Invotra’s secure extranet capability was a gamechanger for DWP during our COVID-19 response. It meant we could onboard colleagues from other government departments to help us out with the unprecedented volumes of Universal Credit claims received. As always, the Invotra team were brilliant during this period, helping us out at short notice if we encountered any issues and reacting quickly to requests for support.

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Joanne Delap
Joanne Delap
Product Manager DWP Intranet

 Built for what governed platforms do next 

DXP already extends to government departments like HSE within days, using distributed publishing, secure targeting and identity governance. Those same principles carry over into AI-enabled workflows.

That’s what Arto does. It’s INV Group’s intelligent workflow platform, and it governs AI adoption the same way: human approval, full audit trails, and orchestration that isn’t locked to a single AI model.

The result: organisations already running governed platforms like DXP can bring AI into equally sensitive environments on the same foundation, rather than building governance from zero.