Your best ideas may not be your own — and that’s a strength. Discover how collaboration and crowdsourcing in public institutions are driving innovative solutions by tapping into diverse perspectives and collective brainpower.
A rural Pennsylvania community expanded broadband internet services using GIS.
Learn how you can increase efficiency by leveraging the power of the citizens you serve.
When do you involve the crowd: In the beginning or end of the change process? Texas HHS involves two different crowds at both ends.
“It would be false to say that people are happily sharing their data with us.” That’s how the Department of Defense’s Col. Bob Saxon explained his agency’s efforts to open up government data. For all of its potential benefits, open data also presents security risks to those providing the information. From loss of agency confidentiality,Read… Read more »
Buried, hopefully deeply, in my hometown newspaper archives, there’s a photograph of a dorky 8-year-old me whose mom dressed her funny. (To be fair, it was the 80s. We were all dressed funny.) In the photo I proudly and nervously showed off my award-winning anti-drunk driving poster of a drawing of a girl crying a single cartoonish blueRead… Read more »
Imagine if a scientist spent a year – every hour of every day – on a single task. The person would account for 8,760 hours of work and need one serious nap. Now imagine if the scientist put out a compelling request for help, and volunteers interested in the problem answered the call. I grew up in aRead… Read more »
Switchboard’s mission is to provide HUD’s citizens, stakeholders, and staff with the tools and channels necessary to interact meaningfully with their government in the following ways: By welcoming and encouraging creative ideation to improve HUD’s programs, policies, and operations, and engaging those interested in the process of putting those ideas into action; By creating avenues of feedback for individuals or organizationsRead… Read more »
It’s no surprise that local governments are utilizing crowdsourcing to solve some of their biggest problems. Crowdsourcing, after all, uses some of the same basic tenets as democracy: where the decisions that serve a body are governed by the majority. Crowdsourcing is being used as a means to allocate budgets, cut waste, and solve longstandingRead… Read more »
At every level of government, citizens are working to learn more and connect, share their ideas, effect change, and improve services. And despite this growing trend of moving all conversations online, there are many government entities that are hesitant to formally endorse or launch this kind of dialogue. Common questions include: “what if the dialogueRead… Read more »