📅 Daily Note: September 23, 2025

Building understanding of software markets in local government from the Local Digital team:

We’ve also identified through roundtable discussions and feedback from partners that managing effective procurements and successfully exiting technology contracts is a challenge, particularly where internal capacity or capability is limited.

With local government reorganisation, new unitary authorities will need to consolidate systems, migrate data, and harmonise business processes at an unprecedented scale. This will also impact technology contracts and procurement activities.

# – micropost 23056


Foundational Specification to support the procurement of social care Case Management Systems:

The Department of Health and Social Care has released a Foundational Specification to support the procurement of social care Case Management Systems (CMSs). Developed in partnership with BetterGov, the Specification is the outcome of a multi-stage consultation process involving a wide range of stakeholders. Its primary aim is to simplify the procurement journey for Local Authorities by providing a clear and consistent guide—helping to reduce the time, cost, and resources required when selecting new CMSs.

# – micropost 23057


Endelvia Matt Mullenweg – is an interesting idea, offering “[p]ersonalized soundscapes to help you focus, relax, and sleep. Backed by neuroscience.”

I definitely work better when I have the right music playing – but £60 is too steep when i already have Apple Music and a bunch of suitable playlists identified.

# – micropost 23059


# – micropost 23060


Why WordPress Lost the Cool Kids (And How to Win Them Back):

Here’s what nobody talks about: WordPress is actually modern. REST API, GraphQL, headless implementations, React-based editing. It powers complex applications and handles millions of visitors. But everyone still thinks it’s “just for blogs.”

The platform regularly outperforms competitors on speed, but gets labeled as “slow and bloated.” Enterprise teams at Sony and Microsoft chose WordPress deliberately—these aren’t legacy installations.

WordPress has Full Site Editing and visual builders that compete with Webflow. They just feel hidden behind confusing historical interfaces.

# – micropost 23061


Another newsletter sent. Am pleased to be getting back into a fortnightly rhythm.

Some delivery issues though, need to have a look at my DNS records to ensure I have them set correctly.

If you’d like to sign up, you can do so!

# – micropost 23062


It isn’t altogether obvious how to send an email to the attendees of an upcoming Zoom meeting, without exporting their details and sending a normal email, which seems sub-optimal.

# – micropost 23063


📅 Daily Note: September 18, 2025

Giles Turnbull: The strategy is enquiry

What I’m suggesting is a new approach for the times when there’s a perceived need for a document called a “strategy”. It shouldn’t be a document full of “we will”; it should be a website full of “what we’re learning”.

Use it to demonstrate your institutional capability to test and learn, to enquire and be curious.

# – micropost 23041


Key learnings from GOV.UK One Login discovery research for local government:

Key themes emerging from the research include:

  • cost savings are essential – councils told us this would be critical to secure leadership buy-in
  • identity verification is a USP – councils value secure verification and the potential to share credentials across local and central government
  • suppliers are open to integration – many are already using, or moving towards, OpenID Connect (OIDC) compatibility
  • forward thinking but stretched – councils want to future-proof systems, but limited resources, capability, and competing priorities are barriers
  • user adoption risks – concerns about digital exclusion, resident trust, and the transitioning of users to a new system

# – micropost 23043


Dave Winer, It’s really simple:

FeedLand is the perfect back-end for a twitter-like system, for the feeds part. And for the words, the perfect back-end is WordPress. I only discovered that about 1.5 years ago. And I had to see what it looks like. No more tiny little text boxes, it’s a real editor that supports all the features of the web. How do I know? Because it saves its data in Markdown. That has come to be the defining format for the text-based web. One which has been totally ignored by the twitter-like systems. How could they miss that? Markdown is like MP3. If you’re mixing sound into feeds you use MP3 of course. It’s there for you to use. As was Markdown. If you’re mixing text you’re mixing Markdown.

# – micropost 23045


Really Simple Licensing – “The open content licensing standard for the AI-first Internet”.

RSL is an open standard that lets publishers define machine-readable licensing terms for their content, including attribution, pay per crawl, and pay per inference compensation.

# – micropost 23046


Avoiding the hidden costs of leadership debt – Oli Lovell, Public Digital:

Technical debt is well recognised. But the same logic of ever-shifting organisational needs – and therefore the debt accrued by standing still – applies to leadership too. As a leader, your skills, models and culture operate as a system of their own, determining how well your organisation is able to adapt and respond to change.

# – micropost 23048


Decision making at the right level with Hats, Haircuts and Tattoos by Emily Webber:

What I like about these definitions is that they provide a framework for considering a decision, while also allowing for the differences and nuances of the situation and the experience of the people making them.

# – micropost 23049


This is a fair challenge:

i know its a lot easier to book the same recurring slot every fortnight / month

but its quite depressing seeing group after group you never get to attend, because they always meet on your non working day 😔

I did the lazy thing with Localise Live! but probably should have mixed it up a bit more. I will be making recordings available to people who sign up, so maybe I need to make it clearer that people should sign up even if they can’t make the meetings, so they get that access…

# – micropost 23050


David Gerrard – UK government productivity not enhanced by Copilot AI

The main uses were “transcribing or summarising a meeting”, “writing an email”, and “summarising written communications”.

The bot didn’t do so well on anything more complicated. Users could churn out PowerPoint slides faster, but worse. Excel data analysis was slower, and worse.

# – micropost 23051


How Tim Cook sold out Steve Jobs by Anil Dash:

There’s a tech industry habit of second-guessing “what would Steve Jobs have done” ever since he passed away, and most of the things people attribute to him seem like guesses about a guy who was very hard to predict and often inconsistent. But recently, we have one of those very rare cases where we know exactly what Steve Jobs would not have done. Tim Cook and Apple’s leadership team have sold out the very American opportunity that made Steve Jobs’ life and accomplishments possible, while betraying his famously contemptuous attitude towards bullshit institutions.

# – micropost 23052


James Plunkett writes What does digital-era healthcare really mean?

When the UK government published its 10 Year Plan for Health two months ago, there was general support for its direction of travel: shifting from analogue to digital, from hospitals to communities, and from treatment to prevention.

The question people asked is whether the healthcare system has the capability to deliver these shifts. Or, put more bluntly, ‘we’ve heard this all before, so why is this time different?’

# – micropost 23054


📅 Daily Note: September 3, 2025

Brent’s Innovation Journey: Building a ‘Base’ for Local Government Innovation by Ryan Hamilton on the LOTI blog:

At Brent, we’ve been trying to rethink how we tackle problems in a way that makes ‘innovation’ not just a buzzword, but a practical, everyday reality in local government.

That journey led us to something exciting: We will soon be launching ‘The Base’ , a dedicated space at the Civic Centre (both physical and cultural) where bold ideas, agile working and collaborative experimentation come to life.

# – micropost 23005


What makes a good outcome? by Jamie Arnold:

In the world of digital and organisational change, being able to define and communicate a strong outcome is a leadership superpower. Whether you’re working on a product, service, or internal shift, a well-crafted outcome sets direction, aligns teams, and builds momentum. Here’s how to make your outcomes truly effective.

# – micropost 23006


New book to improve accessibility of Welsh digital public services – from the Centre for Digital Public Services.

# – micropost 23007


# – micropost 23008


I like the idea of “digital everywhere” – amongst a whole range of brilliant ideas and reflections from Catherine Howe:

Digital everywhere: The embedding of digital practitioners within services alongside a digital skills development program is something I feel we’ve tested in a limited way but clearly it works when done right and I’m really looking forward to having the capacity to develop this approach. This requires a really strong approach to making sure those digital roles are properly designed and also wired into the core digital team as well as clear guide rails that need to be context sensitive.

# – micropost 23009


# – micropost 23011


Product strategy, prioritisation frameworks and responding to change by Alan Wright:

Product teams often face more opportunities than they can act on, with new ones arising all the time. This post explores the link between strategy and priorities, when prioritisation frameworks help or hinder, and how to empower teams to make smart, timely decisions as new opportunities emerge.

# – micropost 23012


From Strategy to Strolls: A Few Weeks of Progress and Pauses, by Atika:

One of the standout achievements in the last few weeks was securing approval for our new strategic framework and governance model. This marks a significant step forward in aligning our digital ambitions with the Council’s broader priorities. The framework, shaped through collaboration and challenge, is now the backbone of how we’ll deliver impact—anchored in transparency, agility, and accountability. We’re also making good progress on the TOM work to make sure we have the culture and capability to deliver this.

# – micropost 23013


The courage to digitally transform with the Digital Layer and AI – interesting talk from Mark Thompson.

 

# – micropost 23019


😮‍💨 Coming up for air

It’s been nearly 6 months since I last posted here, and I have been really quiet on the likes of LinkedIn and Bluesky too. If I am honest doesn’t feel like months, this year has just raced past.

What’s been keeping me busy is a whole range of things, the big one being we moved house (again! but hopefully for the last time) on Christmas Eve – not recommended – and have been having a whole load of work done to make the place work for us. This is the first time I have really owned a house, and it’s been a real learning curve.

While all that was going on I’ve also had ups and downs with my health – as I get older my type 1 diabetes demands more and more of my time and changes to my lifestyle. I’ve been going to lots of appointments, at GPs and hospitals, having injections in my eyes and all sorts of things. It’s all positive, and I am feeling the benefits – but again, it’s just taken up a lot of my thinking time. More recently I have had some awful trouble with my teeth, which took me out of action for a few weeks.

Finally work has been intense this year so far. It’s been brilliant, but knackering. I’ve done loads of strategy work for various councils, as well as looking into areas such as skills, leadership, and more. It’s been incredibly fulfilling, if occasionally stressful at times. I also got to contribute to reports like Future Governance Forum’s ‘Local government for the digital era‘ and the LGA’s research into the implications of local government reorganisation on digital teams.

I’ve also been lucky to be working with the Local Digital team at MHCLG, helping form strategy and approaches to improving the consistency of digital in councils across the country. This is continuing through the year, which is great, and offers opportunities to help research the potential of things like One Login for the sector, amongst other things.

Anyway, the work on the house is coming to a conclusion, I’m feeling better in myself, and work is a bit less intense. So I’m emerging from my cave, reopening my feed reader, and re-engaging with the online world again.

📅 Daily Note: December 13, 2024

Dave Rogers answers the question Just what is ‘Test and Learn’?

# – micropost 22849


Lloyd writes up his experience of new, location based social network thing Mozi. Just like it’s 2008 all over again!

# – micropost 22865


Anything that helps me (and others) understand Wardley Mapping better has to be a good thing. Here’s Will Larson’s Rough notes on learning Wardley Mapping.

# – micropost 22868