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I think it’s probably safe to say that you, like me, think that public servants engaging online as part of their work is the proverbial Good Thing. It might be a tougher challenge if we were to try to put some definitions around this, to describe what sort of digital engagement we’re talking about, and…

Just cross-posting this update I’ve just posted to the UKGovcamp blog: The coming UKGovcamp is going to be awesome: by far the biggest yet, with around 200 people attending. It’s also – amazingly – the fourth national event of its kind, attracting new people as well as becoming a bit of an annual pilgrimage for…

Gulp – we’re two thirds of the way to Christmas! Here’s a reminder of the second 8 days’ worth of tips, in case you’ve missed them: Day 9, we looked at how to use free website thumbnails to liven up site listings Day 10, we found a nice intro to bounce rate in web analytics…

Some things are a numbers game: retail sales, top-flight athletics, fund management. There are standard yardsticks, you can compare the players, and there’s intense competition. Some things clearly aren’t like that: teaching, poetry, social care, research science, political lobbying maybe. That’s not to say that people don’t try, or that there aren’t measurable factors or…

Just a quick one to alert you to the first 8 days of tips, in case you’ve missed them: Day 1, we looked at how QR codes can be used in 26 interesting ways Day 2, we presented the wonderful Morguefile, and some bookmarklets for quick and easy licence-free or CC-licensed images Day 3, we…

Simon Dickson has been asking where the government’s skunkworks project has got to. It sounds like there’s some interesting work going on, appropriately behind the scenes, though there is perhaps a chance to hear more from one of the people setting it up, Mark O’Neill, at the Institute for Government’s event on Tuesday. In the…

We’ve heard the story of the Motrin Moms. Nestle on Facebook. Or YouTube-if-you-want-to. But how can Press Officers and marketers get to practice using social media and getting the tone right so that they can avoid disasters and deal with storms if they hit? For quite a long time, I’ve daydreamed about a social media…

It’s holiday season, as our charming American friends would say, perhaps in a leaked diplomatic cable. To celebrate this Wintervalian festival of giving, I’m sharing one helpful web tool or technique every day from now to Christmas. I won’t be cluttering up the blog with all these tips, so if you want them by RSS,…

Once upon a time, I managed a team who were struggling to crack a tough problem. They needed to improve the dreadful user experience of a major online transaction, but the ‘owners’ of the transaction – a ‘partner’ organisation, in Government-speak – refused to let them have access. The ‘owners’ talked about the extensive user…

I’ve come across this little situation enough times now to make it worth a quick post here. It’s the story of the innovative SME, the minister, and the civil servant. And it’s not exactly a fairytale. The story starts well enough: an enthusiastic entrepreneur develops something clever. They think it could have a great public…