Open Government is about Realizing Economies of Scale through Standardization (Part 4 of 5 of Series)

Now this statement alone may give many of you pause since Open Government is about “openness” and not standardization. But the two are not mutually exclusive. Economies of scale are accomplished because as production increases, the cost of producing each additional unit falls. If we don’t work to standardize the process of and tools required to produce additional units (whether they be blogs, wikis, or other Gov 2.0 tools), the same barriers to entry and costs will exist for each new effort (i.e. development of policies, security plans, employee training, etc). Some examples of standardization already exit. GSA’s negotiated terms of service have provided Federal-wide standardization to most Agencies that desire to use web 2.0 platforms. Whenever you sign up for a social media service (facebook, twitter, etc…) you agree to their terms of service when you register. The terms of service are often seen by legal departments as a “contract” with that tool owner. With the negotiated terms of service, GSA has done the work to provide a standard “contract” that government agencies can use when utilizing these social media tools. Thus, each legal department doesn’t have to struggle through this issue each time a new tool surfaces; GSA has provided a standard that makes development much quicker and easier. Apps.gov is one example of using standards to create economies of scale across the government.

Also, many Agencies have developed Agency-wide use policies that give guidance to employees. However, more standardization can be encouraged at the Agency level that will reduce the barriers to entry for emergent programs and thus accomplish economies of scale.

(Note: Originally posted on the Phase One Consulting Group, Government Transformation Blog when I was an employee there. www.phaseonecg.com/blog)

Open Government is about Enabling Public Private Partnerships and Innovation (Part 3 of 5 of Series)

As the release of OMB’s Open Government Directive approaches, Departments and Agencies should embrace thinking about Open Government in a new way—not as an initiative that can be satisfied through the utilization of web 2.0 tools, but as an opportunity to jump-start and enhance public-private partnerships (PPPs) and innovation that will enhance their mission. PPPs are said to only be possible when partners bring concrete public value, operational capacity, and legitimacy and support to the table. The Open Government initiative contributes to all three of these areas by prioritizing the public value of information sharing, increasing the data available to the public and thus reducing information asymmetry, and providing the leadership support to increase PPPs’ visibility. The bottom line is that the Open Government initiative makes partnering easier in every area of government service provision and the momentum created by OMB’s initial transparency efforts through Data.gov should be leveraged in order to identify and encourage new areas for partnership. The Government should not have a monopoly on innovation. But by withholding data, making processes unnecessarily cumbersome, and making public engagement in decision making extremely difficult (if not illegal—see the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA) for guidelines on reaching public consensus to advise lawmakers), several public service areas have become near-monopolies. This Open Government initiative empowers and requires the Federal Government to break down those walls, to increase openness, and to encourage public private partnerships, so that we may create meaningful and productive innovation and progress through harnessing the best ideas, regardless of their creator.

(Note: Originally posted on the Phase One Consulting Group, Government Transformation Blog when I was an employee there. www.phaseonecg.com/blog)

Open Government is about Leadership, Strategy, and Teaming (Part 2 of 5 of Series)

Putting together a well-balanced leadership and implementation team is essential and should start from the beginning of Open Government efforts. The Office of the Chief Information Officer (OCIO) and the Office of Public Affairs (OPA) should co-lead the effort with executive sponsorship from the highest levels of the organization. While the OPA manages most of the branding and communications for the Agency, the OCIO is uniquely situated, in most cases, at the center of technology, policy and culture issues and thus should be part of the core leadership team. Several other parties should be engaged in Agency-wide Gov 2.0 efforts, including: the General Counsel’s Office (OGC), Chief Technology Officers (CTO), Chief Information Security Officers (CISO), Privacy Officers, Human Resources (HR), and project managers (PMs). These parties must be at the table to ensure all legal, policy, technical, organizational and business factors are addressed when devising an Open Government strategy. Without an Agency-wide effort, programs will utilize social media and Open Government tools on an ad-hoc basis, driving up redundancy, cost, and the instances of inconsistent policies. By embracing the strategy phase upfront, Agencies have the opportunity to ensure that Open Government programs and tools comprehensively:

(1) Enhance the Agency’s mission and make service provision more efficient for the government and useful for the public (2) Channel public energy to partner with the government to innovate productively and; (3) Align with IT standards, federal policies, and Agency strategy.

Teaming doesn’t stop at the strategy level however, it continues all the way down to program development and management. We are all familiar with the teaming required to stand up and operate a tool or program; it’s the strategy leadership—with the exception of the White House and OMB—that has been lacking. Agencies leadership teams should focus on a current “openness” assessment, strategy development, planning, tool selection and then program development and management, in that order, to ensure Open Government adds real value to mission provision.

(Note: Originally posted on the Phase One Consulting Group, Government Transformation Blog when I was an employee there. www.phaseonecg.com/blog)

Open Government is about Technology, Policy and Culture (Part 1 of 5 of Series)

Open Government strategies must consider technology, policy and culture to meet the bottom line goals of Open Government:

1. To ensure cost effectiveness, accessibility, and quality in service provision; 2. To streamline federal efforts allowing Agencies to focus on and enhance their mission areas; and 3. To stimulate the openness that drives public trust and innovation.

We all know this, but until now, the dialogue has been focused primarily on technology, with policy and culture issues thrown in as contributing factors to success, but not inputs that need to be considered before an Open Government plan is even conceptualized.

However, I will argue that technology, policy and cultural components must be considered before tools are even selected in order to get a deeper understanding of what strategies will best assist Agencies in enhancing their mission provision through Open Government. Don’t wait until a tool has been selected to consider security, privacy, stakeholder, legal, resource and communications issues—consider them from the start. Looking at Open Government through this lens will help tool selection decisions be informed based on Agency mission priorities and not merely on what tools are available and sexy.

(Note: Originally posted on the Phase One Consulting Group, Government Transformation Blog when I was an employee there. www.phaseonecg.com/blog)

What Open Government is About: Suggested Intermediate Goals and Guidance for Gov 2.0

There has been a lot of buzz in the last eight months around the concept of Open Government. Last week, the Gov 2.0 community met for an energizing Gov 2.0 Expo and Gov 2.0 Summit, sponsored by TechWeb and O’Reilly Media, which brought together thought leaders, practitioners and federal executives around the ideas of transparency, collaboration and participation. Speakers illustrated success stories, emerging applications, agency specific tools, and an open source vision for today and the future. Gov 2.0 bloggers have been posting summaries and outstanding questions since. September 15, OMB and GSA announced the launch of Apps.gov, a storefront for approved cloud computing applications. Needless to say, there is a lot of activity in the Gov 2.0 world, but it seems that the content of the conference, recent discussions, and recent initiatives have fallen in to two primary categories: technology and vision.

1. The Gov 2.0 event was highly focused on the technology aspects of Open Government. However, Open Government is not ONLY about technology. 2. The Gov 2.0 event also featured plentiful discussion about the desired to-be open source state for government operations. However, there must be intermediate, manageable steps that lead to that to-be state. While I agree with Tim O’Reilly’s statement that “government as a platform” should be an overall goal of Open Government, I also believe that in order to achieve meaningful results from Open Government efforts in the near to medium term, Federal practitioners must have intermediate goals that drive their efforts as well.

To build upon the Gov 2.0 community’s conversation through this new lens, I have compiled the following series of blog postings explaining what I think Open Government is about. These thoughts will hopefully help to focus practitioners on some of the intermediate goals that may assist their Open Government efforts and kick-start the conversation to bridge the gap between the high-level “to-be” state discussions, and the implementation issues at the tool level. Thus, I start by suggesting that Open Government is about…

1. Technology, Policy, and Culture 2. Leadership, Strategy and Teaming 3. Public Private Partnerships and Innovation 4. Realizing Economies of Scale through Standardization 5. Eliminating the Digital Divide

I welcome your comments and additions.

(Note: Originally posted on the Phase One Consulting Group, Government Transformation Blog when I was an employee there. www.phaseonecg.com/blog)