Go West (Again)

I've had a really interesting week last week. I spent time in Edmonton, Vancouver and Victoria.

In Edmonton, I delivered social media training at the Affects Symposium hosted by the Alberta Federal Council. I ran three separate workshops on social media: (1) Putting the Social in Social Media; (2) Social Media 101 for Personal Development and (3) Social Media 101 for Organizational Objectives. I also hosted three roundtable Q and A-style discussions on social media in general. My key takeaway from Edmonton was that there is still a significant demand (and need) for social media 101 training.

In Vancouver I had the opportunity to sit on a panel with two people for whom I have a tremendous amount of respect: Etienne Laliberté and David Eaves. This panel was a long time coming. These men helped shape my career. The conversation was incredibly satisfying and we touched on a number of salient points. The most important of which was an intervention by David where he argued that, 10 years ago this panel couldn't have existed because the three of us would have never been able to connect, share and publicize our ideas to the extent that we have. David went as far to hypothesize that perhaps the three of us would have chosen completely different paths. I can't speak for Etienne and David but I can say that without them I would have surely left the public service a long time ago. While I am grateful for the help, encouragement and brotherly advice the two have given me over the last few years, I am even more grateful to count them among my friends.

In Victoria I attended a planning session for the upcoming Open Gov West BC conference being held at the University of Victoria on November 10. My sense is that the event will be a unique mashup of my experience at ChangeCamp Ottawa, WiredCamp Toronto, Open City Edmonton, and GovCamp. As a speaker for the event, my objective is simple. I want to rally people around a single idea:

We are the future of open government, open data and public sector innovation. We are here learning our trade, stretching the organization, and building the platform for the next generation of government. We are the public servants that the web built.

I'm going to do that by sitting down with my friend Walter Schwabe and share some stories about the importance of openness, the transformative nature of the web and how those things relate to government. I want to share specific examples and help connect the audience to other people in the larger community in hopes that they will continue the conversation after the event.

In short, I'm hoping to inspire people, and I'm hoping to make a case for open government. But most importantly, I'm hoping you will join us in Victoria on November 10.

See you there.

Column: Open City Edmonton

In lieu of a column this week I would just like to encourage you to check out some of the amazing work being done by the City of Edmonton:

The City of Edmonton is hosting the Open City Workshop on Saturday March 6, 2010. This event will bring together community leaders, academics, students, technology enthusiasts and public sector employees to explore and advance the role of Open Information in Alberta's capital region. We will discuss current and planned activities in Edmonton and other Canadian and international jurisdictions as well as possibilities for government, community, academic and private organizations.

On November 21, 2009 the City of Edmonton hosted an Open Data Workshop, primarily targeted at the technology community. The consultation and feedback from the workshop influenced the design of our open data catalogue and set the stage for this event. This time, it's all about collaboration and community. Specifically, we will be working together to develop and establish our local context for an Open City built on access to Open Information. We will work to define the next steps for open data and an application catalogue and explore additional Gov 2.0 concepts such as Social Media, Open Systems, 3D Virtual Communities, and more.

Special Guests David Eaves, Mark Kuznicki and Nicholas Charney will participate and take part in a panel discussion on the topic of Government as a Platform.

I am proud to have been invited to participate and would encourage you to register if you live in the area, the event should be absolutely amazing. If you aren't in the area or can't attend in person, my friends at Fused Logic are providing a realtime stream of the event which I have embedded for your viewing pleasure below, if you want to stream the feed live on your site you can grab the code here.

Round Up: Waking Up Canadian, National Inventory of Bridgeable Students, a friend in need, and more!

Let me open with congratulating @RobWiebe on this great usage of social media in government communications. Both my daughter and I thought it was fabulous, but perhaps we were a little biased. I encourage you to watch the video, pass it along and leave a comment on the youtube channel.



Hopefully you don't fall victim to the cruel irony of not being able to view it behind your departmental firewall like I do.


National Inventory of Bridgeable Students now in GCPEDIA

I have created a National Inventory for Bridgeable Students (NIBS) which can be found here on GCPEDIA. The french is most likely deplorable, but it is there. Have a look and feel free to improve the page or add to the discussion. I have no idea if this will work but it is worth a shot.

Did I mention yet that I love the transformative power of GCPEDIA? If I wanted to roll this out government wide prior to GCPEDIA what would I do? Where would I go? Who would I ask ...

... and if I wanted to do it after GCPEDIA? Well I would create the page, in GCPEDIA, and I wouldn't have to ask anyone... oh wait, that is exactly what I did.


A friend in need

Etienne is looking to help out a friend of his who is looking for federal public service managers w/5 years of experience and 20 employees to do a 60 minute phone interview. Go check out his blog post for more details.


Unofficial Musings

Here is an interesting site that that is built on an interesting concept and is well executed. I wonder what the critical reception. I would also kill to see the even the most basic metrics on the site. [h/t to @spaghetti_p]

Canadian government communicators will be interested in this paper on political control of communications entitled Who is Getting the Message? Communications at the Centre of Government [h/t to @canuckflack]

If you are interested in the concept of "Open Government" you may want to check this out.

Ever wonder about that Canada@150 project that we all got screened out of (at least I, and everyone I know did)? Why not check out these videos on youtube. Not sure how "official" these are but they are there nonetheless.

Looking for some disruptive ideas? You may want to check this out, but remember you didn't get the url from me.

I am not sure if this blogger wanted to get noticed or not but here s/he is... although the last post was back on February 9th.

Speaking of random blog posts, I also found this little gem entitled Public Service Renewal, from the makers of MAFs and DPRs


Official Publications (Canadian and Otherwise)

How Canadians' Use of the Internet Affects Social Life and Civic Participation Annual Report c/o Statscan. Statscan also maintains a page on public service renewal that I hadn't seen until recently.

07-08: Public Opinion Research in Government of Canada c/o Public Works.

Australians' use and satisfaction with e-government services—2008 c/o the Australian Department of Finance and Deregulation.


Advanced Learning Institute's Social Media for Government (in Edmonton)

I will be speaking at #ALI's Social Media for Government conference in #YEG in June, details below. If you are in the Edmonton area and wish to attend the conference fire me an email, I have a promo code for you to shave some dough off the sticker price.

My session is entitled, Putting the Social in Social Media: How to Engage Your Employees before you Engage the Public

In that spirit, just a heads up that this week's column is shares how I use twitter to be a better public servants. It attempts to cover some of what I will cover in my presentation at Career Bootcamp 2009 (Sorry I don't have a link for that handy, but search GCPEDIA and you will find it).

Cheers,

Update: February 22

Hello Everybody,

Just a friendly reminder that I am off to Calgary and Edmonton to speak at the Evolving Public Service and You Conference(s). Needless to say I am super stoked about the opportunity to meet some of my regional colleagues, listen to their stories, and of course spread the Scheming Virtuously meme.

Since I am gone most of the week, I doubt I will be posting anything this week, that includes a weekly column, unless of course I am up for writing one on the plan ride back... which knowing me, is a definite possibility.

You may be able to catch me on twitter a bit while I am gone, but given that I am speaking 4 times in two days it might be fleeting.

Cheers, and send me your good karma, because I would love to pass it on to our colleagues out West.

- Nick Charney