Shining A Light On Gov Change Agents

Time Magazine has their list of the most influential people. The Wall Street Journal chronicles titans of business. And the NextGen Summit has their list of best change agents in government – the NextGen 30.

The NextGen 30 represents all that is great in government leadership, innovation, technology and collaboration. (All month long we introduced them to you in our daily blog series – The NextGen 30.)

For the fifth year, GovLoop and Young Government Leaders have teamed up to present the NextGen Public Service Awards to people who not only work in government, but want to stay working in government for years to come. The type of people government needs to grow and improve!

However, just creating an awards program isn’t going to change the way the public views government. We have to share these awesome government success stories. We have to show the country just how great it is to work for gov. So we asked a few of our friends in industry to help spread the good government word and share a few sentiments with our finalists. 

Here’s what they had to say:

Michael Krigsman, recognized internationally as an analyst, strategy advisor, enterprise advocate, and blogger

“Congratulations to the finalists. Being a change agent in the government is never easy. The government is large, complex and oftentimes you work in the shadows. Your work is not heralded by the press as it is so often in the private sector. You are working because the mission and the meaning are what is important to you. And it is your efforts coming together and aggregating what you are doing with the work of your peers – that is making a change in the government. That work is making government more accessible and bringing efficiencies to the government. As a result making the government more responsive and more beneficial to the citizens. It is an admirable work that you do. It is a special work that you do. I hope you wage this good fight that you have undertaken. Thank you so much for everything you do.” – Krigsman

Craig Newmark, founder and customer service rep of the San Francisco-based international website Craigslist

“I have been working with federal workers for six years. The best advice I can give to government employees is to take control of the way you are perceived. You do really good work, but no one is hearing about it. I suggest that everyone needs to pitch in and federal workers need to do things like using social media to put out the word of the good work that you do. From my point of view, that outreach is going to be needed to generate the kind of respect for the work that you guys do. #respectforfeds.” – Newmark.

Mikkel Svane, CEO of Zendesk

“We believe in the democratization of technology. We want to make it available, accessible, affordable and putting it in the hands of everybody to help drive the mission and improve the organization. Not only do we think we give the FCC agency a new angle on their operations we have also learned tremendously from the agency about how they think about serving the public. That kind of partnership can not only influence the next generation of software, but also the next generation of government.” – Zendesk.

What piece of advice would you have for our NextGen 30 finalist? Register to attend the NextGen Awards Ceremony and get to know the NextGen 30 in-person!