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Government 2.0: early examples of social networking at work

by Joe McKendrick

March 19, 2010 at 5:08 pm · Filed under 2.0 Design Thinking, Enterprise 2.0, FASTforward'09, Social Computing, Social Media, User Revolution, Web 2.0

In the 1990s onward, we heard plenty of discussion around “eGovernment,” and how it would put elected officials and public administrators in touch with their constituencies.

Here it is, more than a decade later in the eGovernment era. Do you feel any more in touch with your elected officials and public administrators? Well, I can fire off an email, instead of writing a letter or calling. And I can apply for a fishing license online. And I can download tax forms from IRS.gov.

But eGovernment did not live up to its promise of increasing citizen participation. As mentioned in a previous post here at FastForward, eGovernment made government a satisfactory online service provider, but can information technology elevate government to the next level — to that of a forum for participation and information sharing? (See my post on McKinsey’s analysis of eGovernment, published in November.)

Can the social networking wave that is emerging help bring about more responsive government organizations?

A new report out of Grant Thornton and FreeBalance says the potential is there, for a number of reasons. “Social networking provides governments with a new paradigm: knowledge release rather than knowledge control. This Government 2.0 approach can harness government knowledge to improve results.” (PDF white paper available from FreeBalance.)

Government 2.0 — enabled through social networking tools — provides benefits such as reduced cost of engagement through more productive tools and processes, simplified knowledge creation and retention though usable applications, easier knowledge sharing, and enhanced information discovery through transparency and data mashups. It all sounds like good mom-and-apple-pie stuff, but is it actually being put to use?

The Grant Thornton report says yes, and cites some examples:

Citizens’ Health Care Working Group (CHCWG): Under the direction of Health and Human Services, CHCWG commissioned by Congress to enlist citizens to provide input to review health care system. Grant Thorton reports that a collaborative solution was “up and running in less than one month.” The greater participation decreased the sost-per-participant by 97%, from $250 per in-person engagement to $7.50 per person online.
Inter-Agency Collaboration Defense Acquisition Performance Assessment (DAPA): The Department of Defense (DoD) tapped global military leaders for help in identifying areas for cost savings. The solution was put together in 72 hours, and was managed by a single DoD employee.
South Florida Water Management District (SFWMD): “Online collaboration enabled agencies from multiple jurisdictions to work together and engage citizens during the project development process.”
Project Public Outreach National Public Safety (NPS): The task force turned to crowdsourcing to develop a design for the memorial to the passengers and crew of Flight 93. More than 1,000 ideas were submitted, Grant Thornton reports.
Project Public Outreach Atlanta Beltline: Planners for a 22-mile rail loop system engaged more than 10,000 citizens online to invite their participation. Their comments were published and addressed within six weeks of the start of the outreach.

The report makes the following three recommendations for improving government operations:

Incorporate “design thinking” (Government 2.0 mindset) as a supplement to “management thinking” (Government 1.0 mindset). “Design thinking” uses a collaborative and iterative style of working that builds up ideas – the best ideas surfacing from a pool of many.”
Improve ability to leverage “viral” change. “Many organizational change management frameworks in use today are static in nature and top-down in structure. They were developed during an era that valued top down, internal to a target audience. … Change Management in the Web 2.0 era is more peer-to-peer, viral – change is pulled by participating constituents, employees, customers.”
Align Web 2.0 initiatives with strategic organizational objectives: “Giving forethought to the anticipated ripple effect of social networks and collaboration on the organization’s business processes, roles, skills, culture and infrastructure lessens negative impacts of reactive change. This reduces the amount of unanticipated impacts which will surface during the pilot or discovery phase.”

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