Dave

John Hayes from IDeA takes to the platform.

• IDeA is 11 years old, just like Google
• 353 authorities, providing 700 services each (in a Unitary authority), 2.1 million people working in local government
• All these people, services and authorities have things in common – hence the communities of practice
• Sustainable self-improvement, efficiency and vfm, connecting people to people
• The CoPs – 60k members, 75k monthly visits, 22k monthly contributions, 1.3k communities
• New experiences of networking in personal lives – ie consumer social media and social networking – need to replicate within work context
• Supporting new ways of working through Local by Social book and the councillors guide to digital engagement
• Recognising the change in behavior and relationships between people, practitioners and communities
• The cuts! The cuts!
• Knowledge hub – new CoPs, more open, more integrated. Mashups and benchmarking also feature and use of linked data
• Less of looking to the centre for ideas, more sharing good practice amongst practitioners
• Built with the sector, for the sector

Now it is Andy Gibson’s turn. He wrote the Local by Social book!

• Andy is hoping to provide some perspective on all the digital stuff
• As railroads transformed the way we work and our society, so will the new online tools
• Imagine a London with no public transport. Would be very different, service provision would be much harder.
• Comms is fundamental to everything that we do. Move away from broadcasting into a two way conversation.
• Enabling communities to come together and help themselves
• Potential to reinvent democracy
• Opportunity for involvement of service users in design of those services
• Budget crisis in public services – radical streamlining of government. Crisis is a good time for innovation!
• Budget issues has brought impetus – the need to do things differently is here, now
• Money decisions are an indication of priorities.
• Pressure to innovate means people need to have ideas at the ready. Attitude to risk may shift – do something in a risky way, or don’t do it at all
• Need for agility, eg in procurement and in development
• Need for government folk to horizon scan and build the arguments. Need to be ready for when the change happens.

I’m at the Local by Social event today, being run by FutureGov and the IDeA. It should be a lot of fun, and I’ll let you share in that fun by live blogging as much of the event as I can!