There’s a lot being written about Gov 2.0 these days. Much of it is repetitive or otherwise easily ignored. SOme of it purports to have the easy answers. SOme of the best just raises the interesting questions. There were a couple of interesting questions raised in the “What Gov 2.0 is making me think” post by Quinn Norton in his blog Quinn Said.
- We all know the commonly accepted stages of grief and loss (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance). Are there common stages in the adoption of Gov 2.0 (or other significant technological or cultural changes in the workplace? If so, what might they be? If we know them we can prepare to manage them and better manage change.
- Way back in the early days of the web, it was common for companies (or governments) staring websites to just post existing print materials. We called it “brochure-ware”. Of course, people thinking ahead were encouraging them to look beyond just throwing up the raw content to taking advantage of the possibilities of the web medium: making the links, starting the conversations. With all of the hype around “open data” (and I know I’ve been pushing it, too) is it really just a 21st century version of brochure-ware – putting up the content without thinking about the links and the conversation?
What do you think?
As a public affairs specialist whose work involves organizational development this is interesting to me. In general to #2 I would say it’s not really a matter of not thinking because I have found agencies to be extremely thoughtful about what they communicate. Rather it seems like a matter of cultural change, even a revolution in the way agencies operate. The old “need to know” paradigm is still very strong. And it is reinforced by the “gotcha” mentality – every time there is a mistake, there is a gleeful rush to portray the govies as a bunch of goofballs wasting taxpayer money. There needs to be movement on both parts – agencies to be less protective of information that’s not confidential, and the media and public to give the government a break and recognize that we’re doing the best we can.
I see the brochure-ware starting to happen…but I think it is a key step…I need to flesh out my thoughts but I agree that there are stages in adoptions both at an individual agency and at a general macro-level for the movement.