Posts
Yesterday (Wednesday) I was privileged to attend a think tank in Melbourne discussing the future of the Victorian Government's whole-of-government intranet, CentralStation.
Being the only state government in Australia I am aware of with such a tool, I was surprised to learn that it had been originally created in 1996. To my knowledge that makes it one of the earliest whole-of-government initiatives in the world supporting public servants across state departments, authorities, local government and other public bodies to collaborate and share information more effectively for the benefit of citizens.
The intranet has been redeveloped several times and currently has a dual focus, providing both whole-of-government content and collaboration tools.
The event was attended by around 30 representatives from state agencies. It was also attended by an invited five person expert panel of experienced online professionals from the Vic private and educational sectors and from the non-Vic public sector (such as myself) to provide an external perspective on the initiatives Victoria is considering.
I think the event went well, with some excellent contributions from the group and several 'ah ha!' moments.
My views from the day on the approach were as follows,
A whole-of-government intranet,
From reflecting on the day, my impression is that whole-of-government intranets are useful tools for aggregating and distributing services and information across government bodies, such as,
I wish the CentralStation team at the Department of Innovation, Industry and Regional Development (DIIRD) all the best in taking the outcomes of the think tank forward in the next generation of Victoria's whole-of-government intranet.
I would also suggest that other jurisdictions could learn a great deal from Victoria's experience in operating their whole-of-government intranet for the last 12 years.
Thursday, October 02, 2008
Building a better Vic whole-of-government intranet | Tweet |
The internet has made us all influencers | Tweet |
Reflecting Forrester's Groundswell report, Universal McCann has released a study detailing how the internet has turned all customers (citizens) into influencers.
Titled INTERNET USERS, THE NEW INFLUENCERS - When did we start trusting strangers? (PDF), the study included around 17,000 internet users from 29 countries, finding that enmasse customers have moved from being passive consumers of products and services to active participants in their creation and evolution.
This has been characterised by three trends,
- the rise in social networks,
- the importance of digital friends, and
- the proliferation of influencer channels.
This has led towards the 'democratisation' of influence online - making every internet user both a potential creator of content and influencer of others.
The study found that organisations needed to reach out to internet users, becoming,
- transparent and honest,
- participate in the conversations,
- encourage customers to share their opinions, and
- approach and collaborate with new content creators.
A slideshow is available as below...
Key findings included,
- 44% of people surveyed have a blog (compared to 28% in 2006),
- 57.5% have a page on a social network (compared to 27% in 2006),
- 42% download video clips (compared to 10% in 2006),
- 34% of users share their opinions about music, and
- 55% share their photos online
Internet users do not rely on brands to inform themselves.
- While 69% visit brands’ official websites,
- 82% prefer to search for information on a search engine
- 55% prefer to read people’s comments on personal profiles on social networks like Facebook.
The preferred methods for exchanging information about a product were,
- via instant messaging (44.5%),
- via email (42.4%),
- followed by blogs (30.4%), and
- social networks (27.6%).
346 million people are reading blogs (state of the Blogosphere 2008) | Tweet |
Technorati has released its report, State of the Blogosphere / 2008, providing a view on the growth and application of blogs as a medium.
The report can be summed up in the statement "blogging is here to stay".
Notable to me in the report was that the fifth top topic and sixth most used tag was 'politics', and most of the other top twenty topics and tags were areas in which government has a significant influence and role.
While 12% of bloggers reported that they did so officially for their organisations, there was no breakdown between public or private organisations.
My assumption, based on my own observances, would be that the share of public sector bloggers would be highest in the US and Europe (where guidelines are in place and there is political and senior civil service support for blogging) and lowest in Australia (where guidelines are not yet in place).
Given the level of blog discourse already occurring on topics related to government services, perhaps Australian agencies need to more closely consider blogging as a communication and interaction tool.
Report highlights
- Technorati has indexed more that 122 million blogs since 2002,
- Bloggers are creating almost one million blog posts per day,
- Four in five bloggers post reviews of products or brands that they love (or hate),
- One-third of bloggers have been approached by companies to be brand advocates,
- 95% of the Top 100 US newspapers have journalist blogs (if you can't beat them, join them),
- 50% of bloggers receive more than 1,000 unique visitors per month, with 18% receiving more than 10,000,
- The more active a blog is, the greater its visibility and traffic, and
- Two-thirds of bloggers do so under their real identity.
Blogger demographics
- 36% of bloggers are aged 25-34 and 27% are 35-44. 23% are 45 or older,
- Two-thirds are male,
- 44% are parents,
- 70% have undergraduate degrees or higher, and
- 40% have incomes in excess of US$75,000 per year.
Blog types
- 79% of bloggers post on personal matters (topics of personal interest not associated with their work)
- 46% post on professional topics (about their industry and profession but not in an official capacity for their employer) - such as this blog
- 12% post on corporate topics (blog for their employer in an official capacity)
Top blog topics
- 54% blog about personal/lifestyle areas
- 46% blog about technology
- 42% blog about news
- 35% blog about politics
Benefits of professional/corporate blogging
- 54% say they have received increased professional recognition (better known in their industry),
- 26% have used their blog as a resume/reference in job seeking,
- 16% have more executive visibility within their organisation,
- 11% got promoted as a result of their blogging,
- 2% were fired or put on probation as a result of something they blogged about.
Wednesday, October 01, 2008
Intranets Live online media channel launched | Tweet |
IBF has launched Intranets Live, a monthly 'online media channel' featuring interviews and commentary on intranets and intranet topics from around the world.
While it is useful to access a monthly podcast on what is occurring around the world in the intranet area, the price tag for this option would require careful consideration by intranet managers.
One (government) portal to rule them all... | Tweet |
Uganda has become the latest nation to announce that it is following a centralised government portal strategy, launching a statewide web portal managed by their Ministry of ICT.
This reflects the approach taken in many other nations, including Australia (www.australia.gov.au and www.business.gov.au) to provide a central face to government online, to a greater or lessor degree.
Given the enthusiasm for this approach in the virtual world, are we likely to see a similar approach to government shopfronts, phone and paper-based transactions reflected at federal level over time?
We've certainly seen some state-based jurisdictions move to single shopfronts - at least in smaller jurisdictions.
However if this isn't the strategy in these channels, what is the rationale for providing different messages in different mediums?
Doesn't it weaken the argument for citizens to not need to know which agency they are dealing with?
- A single central port of call online
- Department/Agency-based offices and paper correspondence
- Service-based phone numbers
What's your view?
