How well is the government using technology to help you?

Summary

The Lab asked this simple question to a people across Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and in e-mail. The survey, which was built using SurveyMonkey, received a total of 121 responses. While not a large number the sentiment expressed, and the detailed responses, provide good insights.

Who Responded?

The respondents were 68.1% male, 31.9% female. The majority of respondents self-reported being between the ages of 26 – 50 (61.2), 21.5% were over 50, and 17.3% were 25 and under.

The respondents were from 9 countries but the majority are from the United States ( 55.4%) and Canada ( 21.5%).

What did we ask?

We asked about people’s perceptions about how well their Federal and Local governments are doing with traditional web sites and with social media to provide citizens with timely and relevant information. Responses were given a numeric rating ranging from 1 to 4 with 1 being the most negative perception and 4 being the most positive perception.

We also asked for their thoughts on how the government could do a better job using technology to aid citizens. These responses were interesting and very informative.

The exact questions asked were:

• How do you feel about this statement? The Federal Government is using web sites effectively to provide citizens with timely and relevant information.
• How many Federal Government web sites do you keep track of?
• How do you feel about this statement? The Federal Government is using Social Media (e.g. Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr) effectively to provide citizens with timely and relevant information.
• How many Federal Government Social Media Accounts do you keep track of?
• How could the Federal government do a better job in using technology to aid you?
• How do you feel about this statement? Your Local Government is using web sites effectively to provide citizens with timely and relevant information.
• How many Local Government web sites do you keep track of?
• How do you feel about this statement? Your Local Government is using Social Media (e.g. Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr) effectively to provide citizens with timely and relevant information.
• How many Local Government Social Media Accounts do you keep track of?
• How could your Local government do a better job in using technology to aid you?

Summary of Responses

Our respondents were slightly negative about how well their governments are doing with providing them with timely and relevant information, with a more negative perception at the local level vs. the federal level and a more negative perception of the use of social media tools vs. more traditional web sites. Keeping in mind that we asked “How do you feel about this statement?” and a score of 1 is means Strongly Disagree, 2 means Disagree, and 3 means Agree, here is the summary:

• How do you feel about this statement? The Federal Government is using web sites effectively to provide citizens with timely and relevant information. Average Response: 2.66.
• How do you feel about this statement? The Federal Government is using Social Media (e.g. Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr) effectively to provide citizens with timely and relevant information. Average Response: 2.22.
• How do you feel about this statement? Your Local Government is using web sites effectively to provide citizens with timely and relevant information. Average Response: 2.35.
• How do you feel about this statement? Your Local Government is using Social Media (e.g. Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr) effectively to provide citizens with timely and relevant information. Average Response: 2.16.

There are great efforts underway and many, many, passionate people working in, and with, government to do a better job share information with citizens. I look at this survey as a baseline and I will be running this same survey every 3 to 6 months to learn how this perception is changing.

Want more information?

I will be sharing this information with all subscribers next week. If you are not already on our mailing list, sign up today to ensure you get the detailed results as soon as they are available next week. These will be attached, in PDF format, to our regular mailings.

John