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The most exciting change I'm seeing in US politics at the moment is the degree of top level support and enthusiasm for transparency in government.
Nextgov has published an article, Obama says he would use IT to open government, which details the strategies the Democrat nominee for President says he will mandate for the US Federal Government to increase their accountability to the public, reducing waste and improving openness.In the plan, Obama says he "will require his appointees who lead the executive branch departments and rulemaking agencies to conduct the significant business of the agency in public, so that any citizen can see in person or watch on the Internet as the agencies debate and deliberate the issues that affect American society. Videos of meetings will be archived on the Web, and the transcript will be available to the public. Obama will also require his appointees to commit to employ all the technological tools available to allow average citizens not just to observe, but to participate and be heard on the issues that affect their daily lives. Obama will require Cabinet officials to have periodic 21st century fireside chats, restore meaning to the Freedom of Information Act, and conduct regulatory agency business in public."
Obama has indicated that he will push the use of blogs, wikis, social networking and other strategies to create a government more connected with constituents.
The full plan is available at Government Executive.
It's both an ambitious plan and an exciting experiment in the government arena. If Obama gets the opportunity to execute, it will be interesting to see the consequences of more open government both in the US's domestic market and in international relations.
Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Greater transparency in government - the US theme for 2008 | Tweet |
Virtual government conferences - when will they start in Australia? | Tweet |
I find conferences a very useful avenue for networking with other egovernment and online channel professionals. I often get ideas or insights that I can share across my team and agency - and implement in our sites.
However the attendance cost continues to rise. Sadly both the commitment in time and price means that I've been cutting back to a few selected courses each year.
I've partially offset the price factor by speaking at events (giving a 40 minute presentation to attend a 2 day $3,000 conference is equivalent to an 'hourly rate' of $4,500).
However this still leaves travel and accomodation costs and the time required to participate (which I can never get back).
A solution I'm seeing more of around the world is to hold virtual conferences - such as the Cognos Virtual Government Forum being held using INXPO's platform.
There are options for similar events via platforms such as Second Life and Webex, as well as ways to use free tools to achieve a similar end.
While these events have a lower networking factor than a face-to-face event (though it can still occur), they provide a similar presentation experience - with the capacity to pick and choose between canned or live presentations and engage in chat-based Q&A sessions or panels.
You do not need to leave your desk, and can tune out for other priorities, then catch-up again at your leisure.
So given the large size and low population density of Australia, when are we likely to see some locally run virtual conferences?
Friday, September 26, 2008
Australian Human Rights commission launches site to name and shame government agencies failing accessibility measures | Tweet |
Further to my post, Australian Human Rights Commission prepared to name and shame government publishers failing online accessibility, the Human Rights Commission has now launched a website that lists government agencies failing to meet their legal obligations under the Disability Discrimination Act 1992.
The site, named Webwatch is visible in the Human Right Commission's site.
The media release announcing the site's launch, WebWatch launched amid moves to improve website accessibility, also made reference to a motion passed by the Senate regarding accessibility of information which helps underscore the importance of making government information accessible online.The Senate yesterday agreed to the following motion, put by Tasmania’s Senator Stephen Parry at the request of Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Families and Community Services, Senator Cory Bernardi:
That the Senate:
(a) notes the difficulties experienced by people with a disability, particularly people with vision impairment, in accessing some formats of Senate documents online; and
(b) calls on the Government and the Department of the Senate to ensure all Hansard and Senate committee documents are made accessible via the Internet to people with a disability as soon as they become public.
What do job seekers think about your department? | Tweet |
Just as organisations can use social network sites to judge the relative merits of potential staff (per my post Locating and learning about future public employees), websites are allowing people to judge the relative merits of potential employers.
How does your department rate?
There's no doubt that people research potential employers online, and in a 'seller's market' for skilled labour it's critical for employers to put their best foot forward.
There are some fantastic job seeker/careers sections in organisational websites - with IBM, Microsoft and Intel having always stood out for me as offering exceptionally good information for job seekers - not surprising given the calibre of the people they wish to attract.
My agency is progressively improving its job section for a similar reason. There's a limited pool of talented people and we need to present them with good reasons as to why they should choose us over other organisations - whether public or private.
Some of the features I consider important in a jobs section include;
- Complete job information - everything a job seeker needs to apply online
- Support tools to make it easier to apply for jobs - particularly for those who are not good at expressing themselves on paper (but shine in interviews) or are unfamiliar with the documentation required by your organisation (such as public sector selection criteria)
- Explanation of the process and timeframes for recruitment (so they don't take another job when they've heard nothing for four weeks) - even better is to provide a 'package delivery' model whereby they can log in to see where their job application is up to in your process at any time (like Fed Express and DHL)
- Information helping employees to understand your organisation's purpose and goals
- Details on why your organisation is a good place to work (pay is rarely the top reason!)
- Social aspects of your organisation - how do the strangers you employ become part of your organisational family
- Developmental opportunities, training and challenges
- Community initiatives - how does your organisation participate with the broader community and 'give back' effort, time and support
- Information (profiles) on your locations (what it's like to work in particular offices)
- Support for people who may be relocating (particularly for Canberra or country town locations)
- Profiles of different career tracks and jobs in your organisation, based on people doing those roles and why they like them
- Career selector tools which support people in finding the jobs in your organisation which best match their disposition and skills (such as at DEEWR's Jobjuice site)
It's also important to consider factors beyond your own website.
Job seekers are influenced by their peers, by news and community sites, social networking sites, online encyclopedias, by recruitment websites and by specialist employer rating sites such as Glassdoor (discussed in the Sydney Morning Herald article, In good company).
Personally I keep a eye out on highly influential sites for Australians, such as LinkedIn, Wikipedia and Facebook, as well as the job sites and popular forums discussing child support topics.
I also monitor where people go when entering and exiting our websites, which provides an indication of other sites which may influence job seeker preferences.
What does your organisation do online to help attract the best applicants?
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Participative budget edemocracy initiative in Brazil provides insights into the future | Tweet |
Brought to my attention by a reader, the Brazilian city of Belo Horizonte, capital of the state of Minas Gerais, has begun using evoting to support it's participatory budget setting process.
Documented in the research report, e-Participatory Budgeting: e-Democracy from theory to success? (PDF), the experience is a very interesting example of the use of evoting in increasing direct democratic participation by the public.
Belo Horizonte is a city of 2.3 million people and 1.7 million voters.
It has used a participatory budget setting process since 1993 to prioritise spending across a range of public works, with the budget directly allocated by voters growing to US$43. This works on the basis of voting in each of the city's districts for specific works within that district.
In 2006, the city launched a Digital Participatory Budgeting (e-PB) involving a fund of US$11 million in addition to the existing participatory budget.
The e-PB allowed registered voters to exclusively vote online for one out of four potential public works for each of the nine districts of the city.
Based on the research report,According to the administration, the launching of the initiative had three main drivers: i) to modernize its PB through the use of ICTs; ii) to increase citizens’ participation in the PB process and iii) to broaden the scope of public works that are submitted to voting.
The approach seems to have worked. While the traditional PB approach attracted around 1.5 percent of voter participation, the e-PB attracted close to 10%, greatly increasing the direct democratic involvement of citizens with the running of the city. It also allowed the PB process to consider public works of interest to all city citizens, rather than those only of interest to the inhabitants of a specific district.
As part of the e-voting process the city adinistration's website featured a forum where citizens could discuss the potential public works initiatives in a moderated environment.
The voting process took place over 42 days with voters able to vote separately for each district's public works - allowing them to vote up to nine times, once per district.
The security of the vote was managed by using unique voter IDs, termed electoral title numbers, which Brazil issues as part of a compulsory identification document to all voters.
Public voting points were established at 187 points across the city to avoid disenfranchising people without internet access. A mobile internet bus was also used, moving from place to place to between areas with the lowest internet access and those with the highest voter concentration (city centre).
While the IT involved in the initiative was significant, the research paper points out that significant factors in the success of the initiative were the communications campaign and ability for voters to interact online to discuss the public works.
The e-PB attracted 503,266 votes by 172,938 voters, or 9.98% of eligible voters.
While this might seem low by Australia's compulsory voting standards, it was seven times greater than the number of participants in the traditional participatory budgeting process, which only received 1.46% of voter participation in the same year.
Interestingly, the research report found that there was no correlation between socio-economic status and propensity to vote, meaning that the e-PB was not weighted towards more highly educated or richer voters (who are more likely to be internet users).
Also a minimum of 30% of votes were recorded from outside the city's limits. Given that only citizens of the city were eligible to vote, the research report found that the internet approach provided an effective avenue for residents who were not present in the city at the time to vote.
The research report has a lot of additional information on the IT systems and communications approaches used, as well as the use of the online forum.
It is an excellent read for any administration looking at introducing a level of electronic voting, either for offices or for policy or budget measures.
