opengovnorth.ca

The OpenGovWest BC conference is now complete. The day was filled with amazing speakers, amazing speaking formats and amazing topics.

One of the highlights of the conference was the talk given by Nick Charney (@nickcharney) and Walter Schwabe (@fusedlogic) where they talked to the audience about participation, and as part of their talk unveiled a blog where folks in the conference were encouraged to participate in real time, right there, while they were talking. Now, days later, blog posts are still being generated on http://www.opengovnorth.ca by individuals and the enthusiasm is still present.

Nick and Walter took a risk. They put the idea out there, provided a place for it to happen and then made a simple request for participation. Though they are both accomplished bloggers they didn’t tell people what to write, or how to write it, and they didn’t try to control the conversation. They shared their ideas generously and provided a space for expression.

When skilled speakers like Nick and Walter encourage audience members share their ideas with each other in real time, while the talk is going on, they are engaging the participants in a vastly larger conversation. And when the talk they are giving happens to be about encouraging this type of engagement then they are really leading by example, in an almost recursive way.

They also weren’t trying to promote themselves, or their organizations, or trying to take credit for anyone else’s work or building their brand.

No, they were just there as Nick and Walter, a couple of guys encouraging us to take a chance and move a little closer to the edge. Giving us a gift, expecting nothing in return. Within minutes the site was crashing because the server had exceeded its capacity.

In a closed model, people focus on controlling the message and dictating top down what is supposed to happen. This model is built on fear and lacks trust and although many results can be and are generated this way, communities are not. Contrast this with what Nick and Walter created.

I agree with others who have remarked that this particular conference has taken us from a great idea to a movement. I think there are several reasons for this and I also want to acknowledge the lead organizer, Donna Horn (@inspiricity), who just like Walter and Nick, used an open approach with with her expertise in community building and leadership to support, encourage and then trust the conveners and speakers to create their own parts of the conference. And the result was a level of enthusiasm from the conveners and the speakers that spilled over to everyone else in the conference.

That’s how a community is created and that’s the power of open.

I came into the room this morning to hear David Eaves relate how he is excited about web 2.0 and social media and how it will allow public servants work better together. Through a more open government, public servants will be better able to self organize and make things happen without needing permission of someone else.

I don’t doubt this is the case in David Hume’s Citizen Engagement group and other pockets of government, however that’s a tough row to hoe for most of the public service. Ok, to tell the truth, as a former government worker (for 4 years) my first reaction to that statement was “What planet is he on? This isn’t government right now, not in BC!”

I used to give mini-media relations seminars to front line government workers where the only thing I wanted them to remember was “NO SURPRISES,” meaning, everything anyone said in a public forum had to be told to the communications people first, so the Minister could be prepared. For every public meeting there is (depending on the deputy and the Minister involved) a small forest of trees cut down preparing approved messaging, briefing notes, information binders, etc.

So while it’s true that 21st century knowledge workers are also citizens, they indeed are butting up against 19th century government, as David mentioned. How are we going to fix it?

I was pleased David offered some answers: cheaper, better, faster and more efficient ways of doing things will be found no matter what – people disobeying their bosses or in resource-constrained environments will be forced to innovate using new social technologies.

During my time in government I saw many examples of conscientious government workers keeping in close contact with their diverse stakeholder groups, mainly by phone (because the best relationships are still formed in person after all), when preparing new regulations or contemplating new initiatives. They developed relationships of trust where they could share limited amounts of sensitive information and trust each other not to use it to embarrass the other. I was so impressed and inspired when I saw that happen.

I also saw the opposite: people so afraid of approaching constituent groups in person that they dug themselves and their minister an issue-laden hole so deep it nearly paralysed the process: all because they were afraid to share with stakeholders and citizens.

Chris Rasmussen alluded to this in his keynote later in the morning: that an environment of fear (of losing one’s job because of government cuts or restructuring) makes people quite conservative and protective of their turf.

I also saw decisions come seemingly ex nihilo from on high that front line workers could not explain to their stakeholders. It made them feel helpless and frustrated to be ordered to implement decisions no one asked for or requested, seemingly at the whim of their leadership.

How do we make innovation and openness happen every single day? It has a lot to do with leadership, and it comes from the top as well as the rank and file, and it starts also with elected officials and senior (Deputy and Assistant Deputy-level) bureaucrats embracing change, being more tolerant of failure and willing to give up control of the process to a certain extent.

I know I’m sounding a little pessimistic, and I don’t mean to. Today’s conference was certainly a bright light and possibly the start of real change.

But certainly, we as citizens must keep asking more of our leadership.

Chris Rasmussen presented on the U.S. government’s Intellipedia – here are some initial rough notes (annotated in places):

• “Too many different tools & systems among gov agencies.” — (We’re facing that within an agency of only 26 people!)
• Kinda stuck on the analytics side. Posting minutes and large docs on wikis os not what the US population asked for with legislation to allow open govt
• We can finally create a living version – collapse arms into joint forces “purple intelligence” — that’s the vision but Chris is stuck getting there
• The official voice matters – a convo on Twitter – how do you verify it as an official entity?
• (We’re finding the same thing with Open Education Resources – people reluctant to use them if they’re not articulated and credentialed…)
• Why can’t social network/wiki stuff be used as the official agency voice against the crowdsourced work flow?
• Records retention system, etc. — Must answer the objections. “Be bold” is getting old, its not structurally redefining our business yet.
• Unless your open gov wiki stuff changes the core way government works you’re going to hit a wall and get stuck like intellipedia did.
• (I relate this to trying to set up a more cohesive Client Management System in my own small organization … it has to be incorporated into the work flow.)
• How long are we going to spin the “change takes time” and “training” cliché??
• Agencies: you’re going to have to give up the outcomes and not control the process end to end. Chris is not seeing indications that agencies want to do that – that’s where they’re stuck.
• We’re now talking about saving money and rationalizing – people’s jobs at stake – can’t achieve enterprise 2.0 success and then get stuck on people worried about turf-saving and job-preserving.
• Love/hate relationships – even people who make lots of changes to Intellipedia have the “Let’s not say things we can’t take back” syndrome.
• This course trajectory might hit any internal environment.
• (Yes Chris, it most certainly does!)

A challenge for libraries, traditional open public spaces, is to bring knowledge of open gov and open data to our users