Being mindful of personal social media use in the APS

Senator Abetz, the Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service, has written a fantastic blog post commenting on the need for Australian Public Servants to be mindful of what they say (and how they say it) on social media.

The post, Public Servants should exercise care with social media, is in the Senator's blog and has also been highlighted in the media.

Regardless of personal view as to whether the current APS guidance goes too far in limiting public participation by public servants in policy matters which affect them as a citizen, or in their ability to participate in public political debates, it is great to see the Minister responsible for the Public Service taking a measured public position which aligns with the current guidance.

Government today makes extensive use of social media in communication, engagement and customer service and public servants, like other Australians, are likely to use social channels personally and professionally to maintain their networks and express their views.

Social media use is normal throughout our community and within the Australian Public Service. It isn't something to be feared or suppressed and the fears of widespread misuse have not been realised in practice.

Instead, for the most part, people have used social media well, although certain agencies still restrict access to and use of these channels - both personally and officially.

If agencies want to further minimise their perceived risks with social media, they need to focus on educating and supporting their staff to use these platforms wisely and within clear guidance.

To achieve this agencies need to have guidance and education in place. Later this year I'll be asking them to see how many (at a federal level) already do, and comparing it with my research two years ago (when under 25% did).

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Canberra University launches Graduate Certificate in Social Media and Public Engagement

Universities in Australia have lagged behind public and commercial use of social media and need for their staff to be trained in effective development and implementation of online engagement approaches.

However this looks to be changing with the launch of Canberra University's Graduate Certificate in Social Media and Public Engagement.

As a one year part-time primarily online course the Graduate Certificate aims to give participating students the practical skills and theoretical knowledge they need to work in rapidly changing online and social media environments - with a particular focus on a public sector context.

Each semester involves a face-to-face masterclass with academics and social media professionals, with ongoing lectures and coursework delivered online. This means the course is accessible to potential students right across Australia.

Designed to support public servants who are new to online engagement, or are seeking formal qualifications to back-up their existing experience, the course is rated as relevant for a broad range of public sector professionals including communications and information communications technology staff, policymakers and stakeholder/community/online engagement managers.

It may also be valuable for people working in other sectors in roles that touch on or who are interested in social media and social technologies, change, e-government more broadly, public policymaking, the media and society, and the formation of public opinion.

I'm pleased to say that the course developers have consulted extensively with senior public servants and public sector social media practitioners. I've also been involved in providing input into the program (and will help out in some of the course delivery).

More information on the course is available at Canberra University's website (http://www.canberra.edu.au/faculties/arts-design/courses/postgraduate/social-media) - and there's still time to enrol for the 2014 intake!

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Rethinking government IT to support the changing needs of government

We recently saw a change in the federal government in Australia, with a corresponding reorganisation of agency priorities and structures.

Some departments ceased to exist (such as Department of Regional Australia), others split (DEEWR into two departments, Education and Employment) and still others had parts 'broken off' and moved elsewhere (Health and Ageing, which lost Ageing to the (renamed) Department of Social Services).

This isn't a new phenomenon, nor is it limited to changes in government - departments and agencies are often reorganised and reconfigured to serve the priorities of the government of the day and, where possible, create efficiencies - saving money and time.

These adjustments can result in the movement of tens, hundreds or even thousands of staff between agencies and regular restructures inside agencies that result in changing reporting lines and processes.

While these reorganisations and restructures - Machinery of Government changes (or MOGs) as they are known - often look good on paper, in reality it can take time for efficiencies to be realised (if they are actually being measured).

Firstly there's the human factor - changing the priorities and allegiances of staff takes time and empathy, particularly when public servants are committed and passionate about their jobs. They may need to change their location, workplace behaviours and/or learn a new set of processes (if changing agency) while dealing with new personalities and IT systems.

There's the structural factor - when restructured, merged or demerged public sector organisations need to revisit their priorities and reallocate their resources appropriately. This can extend to creating, closing down or handing over functions, dealing with legal requirements or documenting procedures that an agency now has to follow or another agency has taken over.

Finally there's the IT factor - bringing together or separating the IT systems used by staff to enable them to do their work.

In my view the IT component has become the hardest to resolve smoothly and cost-effectively due to how government agencies have structured their systems.

Every agency and department has made different IT choices - Lotus Notes here, Microsoft Outlet there, different desktop environments, back-end systems (HR and Finance for example), different web management systems, different security frameworks, programming environments and outsourced IT partners.

This means that moving even a small group of people from one department to another can be a major IT undertaking. Their personal records, information and archival records about the programs they work on, their desktop systems, emails, files and more must be moved from one secure environment to another, not to mention decoupling any websites they manage from one department's web content management system and mirroring or recreating the environment for another agency.

On top of this are the many IT services people are now using - from social media accounts in Facebook and Twitter, to their email list subscriptions (which break when their emails change) and more.

On top of this are the impacts of IT service changes on individuals. Anyone who has worked in a Lotus Notes environment for email, compared to, for example, Microsoft Outlook, appreciates how different these email clients are and how profoundly the differences impact on workplace behaviour and communication. Switching between systems can be enormously difficult for an individual, let alone an organisation, risking the loss of substantial corporate knowledge - historical conversations and contacts - alongside the frustrations of adapting to how different systems work.

Similarly websites aren't websites. While the quaint notion persists that 'a website' is a discreet entity which can easily be moved from server to server, organisation to organisation, most 'websites' today are better described as interactive front-ends for sophisticated web content management systems. These web content management systems may be used to manage dozens or even hundreds of 'websites' in the same system, storing content and data in integrated tables at the back-end.

This makes it tricky to identify where one website ends and another begins (particularly when content, templates and functionality is shared). Moving a website between agencies isn't as simple as moving some HTML pages from one server to another (or reallocating a server to a new department) - it isn't even as easy as copying some data tables and files out of a content management system. There's enormous complexity involved in identifying what is shared (and so must be cloned) and ensuring that the website retains all the content and functionality required as it moves.

Changing IT systems can be enormously complex when an organisation is left unchanged, let alone when when teams are changing agencies or where agencies merge. In fact I've seen it take three or more years to bring people onto an email system or delink a website from a previous agency.

As government increasingly digitalises - and reflecting on the current government's goal to have all government services delivered online by 2017 - the cost, complexity and time involved to complete  these MOG changes will only increase.

This risks crippling some areas of government or restricting the ability of the government of the day to adjust departments to meet their policy objectives - in other words allowing the (IT) tail to wag the (efficient and effective government) dog.

This isn't a far future issue either - I am aware of instances over the past five years where government policy has had to be modified to fit the limitations of agency IT systems - or where services have been delivered by agencies other than the ones responsible, or simply not delivered due to agency IT restrictions, costs or issues.

Note that this isn't an issue with agency IT teams. These groups are doing their best to meet government requirements within the resources they have, however they are trapped between the cost of maintaining ageing legacy systems - which cannot be switched off and they don't have the budget to substantially replace them - and keeping up with new technological developments, the increasing thirst for IT-enabled services and gadgets.

They're doing this in an environment where IT spending in government is flat or declining and agencies are attempting to save money around the edges, without being granted the capital amounts they need to invest in 'root and branch' efficiencies by rebuilding systems from the ground up.

So what needs to be done to rethink government IT to support the changing needs of government?

It needs to start with the recognition at political levels that without IT we would not have a functioning government. That IT is fundamental to enabling government to manage a nation as large and complex as Australia - our tax system, health system, social security and defence would all cease to function without the sophisticated IT systems we have in place.

Australia's Prime Minister is also Australia's Chief Technology Officer - almost every decision he makes has an impact on how the government designs, operates or modifies the IT systems that allow Australia to function as a nation.

While IT considerations shouldn't drive national decisions, they need to be considered and adequately resourced in order for the Australia government to achieve its potential, realise efficiencies and deliver the services it provides to citizens.

Beyond this realisation, the importance of IT needs to be top-of-mind for Secretaries, or their equivalents, and their 'C' level team. They need to be sufficiently IT-savvy to understand the consequences of decisions that affect IT systems and appreciate the cost and complexity of meeting the priorities of government.

Once IT's importance is clearly recognised at a political and public sector leadership level, government needs to be clear on what it requires from IT and CIOs need to be clear on the consequences and trade-offs in those decisions.

Government systems could be redesigned from the ground-up to make it easy to reorganise, merge and demerge departments - either using common IT platforms and services for staff (such as an APS-wide email system, standard web content management platform, single HR of financial systems), or by only selecting vendors whose systems allow easy and standard ways to export and import data - so that a person's email system can be rapidly and easily moved from one agency to another, or the HR information of two departments can be consolidated in a merger at low cost. User Interfaces should be largely standardised - so that email works the same way from any computer in any agency in government - and as much code as possible should be reused between agencies to minimise the customisation that results in even similar systems drifting apart over time.

The use of these approaches would significantly cut the cost of MOGs, as well as free up departmental IT to focus on improvements, rather than meeting the minimum requirements, a major efficiency saving over time.

Unfortunately I don't think we're, as yet, in a position for this type of significant rethink of whole of government IT to take place.

For the most part government still functions, is reasonably efficient and is managing to keep all the lights on (even if juggling the balls is getting progressively harder).

It took the complete collapse of the Queensland Health payroll project to get the government there to act to rethink their systems, and it is likely to take a similar collapse - of our Medicare, Centrelink or tax system - for similar rethinking to occur federally.

However I would not like to be a member of the government in power when (not if) this occurs.

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Save the date for BarCamp Canberra - 15 March 2014

The 7th annual BarCamp Canberra has just been announced and will be taking place on Saturday 15 March this year at the Gungahlin Library.

BarCamp is a free day-long event where several hundred people gather to share insights and ideas on a range of topics including design, IT, public service and more.

It's well worth attending and, if you're something you wish to say, presenting at as well.

The unorganisers (which includes me) are looking for people willing to help out on the day and we welcome sponsorship enquiries.

For more information on the event, what a BarCamp is and how to attend or help support BarCamp Canberra, visit barcampcanberra.org

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Farewell to the Victorian Government eGovernment Resource Centre

The Victorian Government eGovernment Resource Centre was launched more than ten years ago as a repository of news and information about eGovernment from around the world.

The eGovernment Resource Centre in 2002

The site (at www.egov.vic.gov.au) grew to contain tens of thousands of resources and articles on eGovernment and related topics, attracting tens of thousands of visitors each month.

Over the years the site's focus expanded to cover Government 2.0 activities around the world, a monthly enewsletter on the latest eGovernment and Gov 2.0 initiatives and a range of community features as well as a social media presence.

The eGovernment Resource Centre in 2013

During its life the site became widely known and highly regarded as Australia's premier source of eGovernment information.

The eGovernment Resource Centre was also highly regarded overseas, being recognised at the 2008 World e-Democracy Awards and having many overseas governments and Gov 2.0 experts reference or link to the site as well as many practitioners rely on it for information and news.

Alas, due to a changing focus in Victoria, the eGovernment Resource Centre was discontinued at the end of 2013.

All the information, articles and links the site contained after more than a decade of operation have been taken offline. The many links in Google search and 3rd party website now redirect to the Victorian Government's digital strategy.

I, for one, am sad to see the demise of this great eGovernment and Government 2.0 resource. For years it was my bible for what was happening around the world in these topics - always with new information, insights and initiatives that could be used to influence and improve the government agencies I worked for and with.

The loss of access to the information and resources in the eGovernment Resource Centre is likely to also affect many public servants within Australian governments, and the publics they serve for years to come. Even if they don't realise what they are missing, the lack of easy access to knowledge and past experience will surely affect the level of 'corporate knowledge' related to egovernance within the Australian public sector.

Kudos must go to the Victorian Government for running the site for as long as it did, as well as particular thanks to the individuals responsible for keeping the site current, useful and usable - particularly one individual in particular who curated the site for many years (you know who you are).

However for every ending, there can be new beginnings. It is the start of a new year and hopefully we'll see governments across Australia continuing to improve and enhance their online engagement systems and release more of their data openly and in reusable formats.

It may also not be the end for the eGovernment Resource Centre - I am looking for ways to resource and renew the Centre, building on the fantastic site the Victorian Government supported and extend it into a sustainable global eGovernment and Government 2.0 resource.

Anyone who wishes to get involved, please drop me a line.

However, for now, the Victorian Government's eGovernment Resource Centre is no more.

It was a great resource built with a great deal of vision. While the resource is gone, I hope the vision is not.

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Which license should government open data be released under? (CC0 vs CCBY)

An interesting article was brought to my attention by John Sheridan as below, on the use of CC0 licensing of government data.

RT @digiphile: Advocates Release Best Practices for Making #opengov Data “License-Free” http://t.co/4mWWaUhsIY #opendata #cc0 #gov2au
— John Sheridan (@sherro58) December 15, 2013

The article, Advocates Release Best Practices for Making Open Government Data “License-Free”, recommends CC0 as the default license for a range of reasons. I've responded with my views on why CC BY is a better choice and there's been a subsequent thread of comments.

I'm not going to spread the discussion to my blog, as it is easier to follow while contained in one place, so please follow the discussion at E Pluribus Unum and contribute as you see fit.

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How do we avoid the chicken & egg of open data (and the failure of the opendata movement)?

Open data drives economic value - there's been no dispute on this score after a range of reports have indicated the massive value that open data can unlock for an economy.

Cap Gemini estimates that open data was worth 32 billion euros in 2010 to Europe, growing at 7% per year, while McKinsey estimates the global value at US$3 trillion per year and the UK estimated earlier this year (PDF) that the value of releasing their geospatial data alone as open data would be 13 million pounds per year by 2016.

There's been a range of similar reports across the world (as aggregated by the Open Data Institute) - all of which point to a similar conclusion.

However realising this economic value, in productivity, efficiencies and direct revenue, is dependent on governments doing one thing that they've so far failed to do - releasing open data in a planned, consistent and managed way.

Thus far most governments have followed a haphazard route to open data, releasing the 'low hanging fruit' first (data already in releasable form, with few privacy concerns and considered 'low risk' as it doesn't call into question government decisions), and then progressively releasing esoteric and almost random data sets at inconsistent intervals.

Many governments have clear processes for individuals and organisations to request the release of specific data sets - however a clear process which doesn't support the goal is of little value.

These requests have little influence on agency decisions on releasing data and I have yet to see any government mandate that these requests need to be officially considered and actioned or responded to within a set timeframe.

Without any real weight or structure, processes for requesting data sets can't be relied on by people seeking to build a business on open data.

Data consistency is an even bigger issue. In nations like Australia the federal and state governments each have their own open data sites. However there's no agreed national strategy on data release. Every jurisdiction releases different sets of data, with few attempts to aggregate state-level data into national datasets covering all jurisdictions.

Even when similar data sets are released by different states this is complicated at the back-end by different laws, different collection techniques and frequencies and differences in analysis and measurement approaches - not to mention differences in formats and naming conventions. This can make it costly, if not impossible, for businesses or individuals to aggregate data from different states and use it for a national goal.

On top of this, many agencies still resist calls to release data. Some due to a closed culture or a hope that 'open data' is a passing fad, others due to the costs of reviewing and releasing data (without any ability to offset them in fees or additional funding) and some due to concerns around data quality, political impact or reputational damage to the agencies themselves.

My fear is that we're reaching a chicken and egg impasse - agencies and governments are reluctant to do the work and spend the money required to develop consistent data release approaches and mandates without seeing some the economic value from open data realised. Meanwhile individuals and organisations are reluctant to build business models on a resource that is not reliably available or of a consistent quality.

There's no commercial model for open data if governments can turn off specific data, or entire open data initiatives on at a whim (as we saw data.gov shut down recently in the US Government shutdown). Businesses need to be able to count on regular publication of the data they use to build and inform their enterprise.

There's also a lot less value for governments in releasing their data if companies are reluctant to use it (due to a concern over the above situation).

So how should countries avoid the chicken and egg issue in open data?

There's two approaches that I have considered that are likely to work, if used in tandem.

Firstly, governments must mandate open data release and take appropriate steps to develop ongoing data release approaches, which clearly and publicly state what data will be released, at what frequency and quality level. This should include a data audit establishing what an agency owns (and may release) and what it doesn't own, as well as the collection costs and frequency of specific datasets.

To maximise the value of this approach for states within a nation there needs to be a national accord on data, with states (or as many as possible) developing and agreeing on a consistent framework for data release which works towards normalising the collection, analysis and release of data so that it can be aggregated into national datasets.

Secondly there needs to be thought put into the difference between open and free data. Individuals and organisations who use government open data for personal, educational or not-for-profit use should be able to access and reuse the data for free. However where they are using open data for profit (at an appropriate threshold level), there should be the scope for financial contracts to be put in place, just as there is for most other resources used to generate profits.

This approach would provide a revenue stream to the government agencies releasing the data, helping offset the collection and publication costs. Contracts should also be structured to provide insurance for the data users that the data will be released on a set timetable and to a defined quality level throughout the life of the contract.

There would need to be significant thought into how these financial contracts would be structured with significant flexibility built in - for example allowing cost-recovery for developers, who may spend many hours developing and maintaining the services they build with government open data and avoiding the upfront fee model which becomes a barrier to new entrants to make profitable use of open data. There would also need to be consistency in these contracts nationally for state data - potentially a major challenge in Australia.

However if implemented thoughtfully and with significant consultation and ongoing review, a combination of rigour in data release and cost-recovery for profitable use of government open data would avoid the emerging chicken and egg issue and provide a solid and sustainable foundation for realising economic value from open data - value that would help support Australia's economy, social equity, education and scientific research into the future.

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The great Gov 2.0 'sporting' contest between Australia and Britain

Not this urn...

It's December, and Brits and Aussies alike have turned their thoughts to Christmas, family, parties, holidays and travel.

There's also a very special content underway down-under between Britain and Australia, consuming the thoughts of millions.

It all revolves around a very particular type of urn...

An urn containing the ashes of Australian cricket?

No, the urn that we all visit every day, our toilet.

That's right - it's time for the Great Gov 2.0 Toilet Map face-off!

Let me introduce the two contenders:

Australia: 
The National Public Toilet Map (https://toiletmap.gov.au)

Operated by the Department of Social Services as part of the National Continence Program, the National Public Toilet Map features information 16,000 public and private toilets across Australia and is available as a website and as both iOS and Android apps.

Originally developed in 2001, the Map is a Gov 2.0 style service which pre-dates Gov 2.0.  It has been progressively redeveloped and improved over the last twelve years to keep it current, usable and accessible.

The National Public Toilet Map includes information on toilet location, accessibility, baby change facilities, sharps disposal, sanitary disposal and much more, allowing users to identify the toilets that are appropriate to their needs.

Besides being able to search for toilets by location and needed features, the trip planner allows people to map their route and find appropriately located toilets along the route. You can even favourite or print details for specific toilets and download GPS data to your car's GPS system.

This might sound a little naff to some, however if you're a parent with young kids, a tourist, or one of the estimated 3.8 million Australians suffering from incontinence, a toilet map that's available on the road is vital for travel plans.

The service is hosted on Telstra's cloud and built on Google Maps - meaning it's unlikely to go offline in the case of high demand (such as after Christmas lunch).

As a bonus, data for the map is available in data.gov.au for people to mashup and reuse, and apps have been independently developed for Android and Windows mobile devices.


Britain: 
The Great British Public Toilet Map (http://greatbritishpublictoiletmap.rca.ac.uk/)

The Great British Public Toilet Map isn't a government-run service, however was developed in 2012 using open data released by councils as part of the Tackling Ageing Continence through Theory Tools and Technology TACT3 research project.

The Map is actually not even of all of Britain - being limited to London and a few other cities, where councils and other government authorities release data on toilets.

The Great British Public Toilet Map only features a basic search feature and zoom, with none of the trip, sharing or favouriting features in Australia's service. Information on individual toilets is limited - with some toilets having opening times, details on accessibility and baby change facilities, but most being limited to only the location.

There is some open data on toilets available from the UK's data.gov.uk - but only for one London council. This means that developers in the UK don't really have much ability to create sites or apps that help people locate toilets when they need them.

Given it is estimated that there's up to 6 million people in the UK suffering some form of urinary incontinence, plus millions of tourists and business travellers visiting the UK each year, it's disappointing to see the lack of a true national British Public Toilet Map, whether provided publicly or privately using open data.

The winner:

It's pretty clear the British are not performing to expectations, and Australia's commitment and experience is paying off, allowing them to dominate the field with their coverage, flexibility and scope, and knock the ball for six with features.

This isn't just for the cricket, where Australia is threatening to wipe out the British and reclaim The Ashes.

It's also for providing relevant and timely information on public toilets, helping citizens and tourists alike.

Australia has a much stronger National Toilet Map - with national coverage, excellent features and the open data required for developers to incorporate a national map of toilets into their own online services.

There's only one consolation for the British. 

While their 'Balmy Army' is flocking to Australia to watch the cricket (and take in the Australian sun and surf), at least they'll have no problems finding a toilet after a long hot day at the game.

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Australia beyond Gov 2.0 - Gov 2.0 Radio broadcast from the Govinnovate forum

Gov 2.0 Radio has released the live broadcast of the final panel from the Govinnovate conference, 'Australia beyond Gov 2.0', one of the panels I participated in.

Find out more about the broadcast, panel and Gov 2.0 radio at gov20radio.com/2013/12/beyondgov20/

Or listen to the panel below.

More Technology Podcasts at Blog Talk Radio with Gov 2.0 Radio on BlogTalkRadio

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Partial participation for partial residents?

A challenge for governments today (particularly local ones) is how to consider the views of non-residents, people who travel into their jurisdictions for work, entertainment or other reasons.

While consulting them within formal processes is possible, it can be hard to engage them beyond the most cursory involvent in local issues, even when many of the decisions in a town, city or state significantly affect their livelihood or welfare.

This is already a topic amongst many of the local governments I speak to, who must weigh the interests of people who travel from nearby council areas to work in their jurisdictions. These people may be spending from a quarter to half their time within the jurisdiction they work in, accessing local services such as roads and parking, libraries, public toilets, parks and civic offices.

Equally local residents may do nothing more than physically live in a jurisdiction - accessing many or most of the services they need from a neighboring jurisdiction. With border towns in Victoria, New South Wales ACT and Queensland residents may be accessing most services from another state.

Society has evolved methods for accounting for the cost of these services, through user-pays schemes and border agreements, however methods for recognising a non-resident, or rather a partial-resident's stake in decision making processes are still limited, possibly because it required significant technology to accurately estimate how much time a person spent within a jurisdiction and account for this in decision making.

So as society moves towards a 24/7 awareness of where individuals spend their time, via GPS in mobile devices, should governments reconsider the basis of the decision on who gets a say in elections,? Considering time spent in a jurisdiction rather than, or in addition to, land-ownership, residency or citizenship.

Let's consider how this might work.

If a resident of one jurisdiction works in another, they could use their mobile device to record their location over a period of time like a log book or diary - which many drivers keep for tax purposes.

After a significant time period (mayb a month or two) they would register their location with the councils where they spent most of their time, so they can be assessed as a  'partial-resident, entitled to vote in council elections with a fractional vote representing the time they spend in the region.

With the right ICT systems this would not be excessively hard to track - perhaps to offset costs people who wish to be considered partial residents would be required to cross a time spent threshold (maybe 10%) and be charged a fee based on this percentage, which offsets the cost of the services they use (unless they can prove they should get a waiver based on appropriate grounds).

On being registered, partial-residents would be entitled to vote in local elections, however their vote will only count proportionate to the registered amount of time they spend in the jurisdiction.

Full-time residents will get full votes, meaning that an issue would need to be particularly large for partial-residents to change the outcome of an election.

This might be an unworkable system - I can think of several ways it could be gamed that would need careful thought. However the question is a valid one - with people increasingly travelling to work and play, how do governments ensure they have an appropriate say in local decisions?

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What will future digital services in government look like?

On Wednesday I attended Intrepid Minds' Digital Service Delivery in Government conference. It was a good conference, with decent attendance and an excellent range of speakers (moving far beyond the usual suspects).

At the event I gave a presentation on the future of digital service delivery - a topic which let me discuss some (and by no means all) of the new technologies and trends on our horizon.

I probably didn't go quite futuristic enough on some areas. One area I saw as being five years out, virtual service officers in shopfronts, is already in use by Centrelink (as I was told by a DHS representative at the conference). The future can creep up on us quickly!

However my overall message was not about any specific services or trends - it was about the need for governments to closely consider the consequences of the decisions they make today.

Laws governments create, or technologies or approaches agencies choose, can turn into blind alleys or have expensive and damaging consequences.

While government doesn't generally seek to be an early adopter, it still has enormous influence over how society is shaped through how laws are crafted and grant or assistance programs are designed.

This means that even when governments see certain areas as too immature or risky to get involved with, they can still influence their development and indirectly select for or against certain trends.

We're at a point in history when change is happening too fast to ignore, challenging institutions designed for a slower-changing society. Government needs to continue delivering - but do so in a flexible and agile way that reduces the risk of getting locked into specific shapes or systems that can rapidly shift. To do this, the public service must strengthen its capability to scan the horizon, learn how to fail fast and become better at testing and iterating, using open approaches and platforms and identifying and engaging the right stakeholders.

In the conference there were some strong views for and against some of the ideas I presented - which is a good thing. We need to have these discussions now to ensure that the influence governments have, and the choices they makes, continue to deliver positive social and economic outcomes for society and for within government itself.

Below are my slides. While they don't provide the same depth as my presentation, they may still be useful in stimulating thinking.

Note: All images from The Jetsons are copyright Hanna-Barbera

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