Australiam Gov 2.0 Taskforce announces winners for its brainstorming and innovation competitions

Australia's Government 2.0 Taskforce has announced the winners of its structured brainstorming competition, which was held in September - October this year.

The competition involved public submissions and voting via an ideas market system with the final decision on winners being made by the Taskforce.

In the structured brainstorming category there were two winning ideas, both nominated by Brad Peterson,

• Government Gazettes in XML
• Whole of government persistent URL resolver service

In the Government 2.0 Innovators category, the Taskforce announced three winners,

• Large agency: ABC Pool
• Small agency: Mosman Municipal Council
• Individual: Craig Thomler (yes, that's me)

I'm honoured to both have been nominated and to have been selected amongst the winners and would like to commend the other winners for their efforts.

I'd love to see similar events run on a ongoing basis to help encourage the suggestion of good ideas, reward those innovating in government and inspire others to do likewise - similar to the US's SAVE award (introduced by President Obama in September).

Perhaps this would even inspire agencies to run similar awards/competitions internally to encourage innovation that improves their operations, as the US Transportation Security Administration does via its IdeaFactory tool.

It is very hard to manufacture innovation in a highly structured organisation, however it is relatively easy to recognise and reward it.