Here are 2 relevant links on this topic.

1. http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/wikipedia_training_for_us_health_department.php
Wikimedia have been invited to run some training courses for United States National Institutes of Health (NIH). Maybe Angela Beesley could help organise a similar thing here in Australia.

2. http://upcoming.yahoo.com/event/2888376
Microformat Dev Camps are beginning. It would be great to run this type of event for Gov Workers in Australia to start them thinking about structured data in an open and tangible way. From here it’s a natural evolution to RSS/Feeds and then APIs.

Mostly the people we deal with across the public sector are good people with good intentions but I am often surprised that they seem to lack some pretty fundamental web knowledge or, better said, web consciousness.

I think that the TF might look at how these skill levels may be increased, perhaps with digital boot camps for all involved in online work.

Perhaps this could be considered a part of their induction into their new jobs.

One thing I don’t think anyone has covered yet is the lack skills and knowledge needed to use the new web tools and technologies.

There are still many staff in State and Fed gov departments with not enough skills and knowledge of current web technologies.

I know many web officers who didn’t know what twitter or blogging was a few months ago. Sure you don’t need to blog or use social networks but if you have a web job then you need to at least know about current and future technologies. right?

The following para is from a blog I was reading before and I thought was spot on when it comes to the current staff skills. http://is.gd/1yyyK

Each Agency will need existing staff either trained, and trained well in Social Media or engage an existing Social Media resource, with individual agencies adopting the Whole of Government Framework and adapting to their Agencies needs.

Maybe there needs to be a review on current skill standards when it comes to gov web jobs.

However I do worry that making a crack to let the light in isn’t enough. From my observations many people working in government have been able to see the web 2.0 light for some time, but the barriers to practice have been too high. Hopefully the TF will highlight a way to make some of the web 2.0 tools taken for granted by hose of us in the private and not-for-profit sectors feasible at a government department and agency level.

This won’t happen as long as the general mood persists that government needs to just have a culture change and “get over” their concerns as many insist. I for one, speaking as a private citizen, don’t want to see the Australian governemnt “get over” concerns about privacy, liability or security. I want to see them solve those problems properly – and they can be solved – but not by ignoring them.

Interlinked with this issue is the danger that Gov 2.0 can be seen as a seperate project. There are always budgetary contraints to that every department and agency can do and they should only be considering 2.0 solutions when they enhance efficiency of how they perform their core functions.

Let’s not be so enamoured with the concept of innovation that we all forget that delivering government services better and cheaper way is the goal (not in a cooler way)!

Thanks

Sally

Good to see engagement starting. Good post. It is good to have the TF as a a focal point, and ideally as a platform enabler.

Would like to see some real serial entrepreneurs that have delivered real things domestically and globally get involved. Formally. Deeply. Broadly (not just tech).

Seems like a relatively large gap given the role we pay in paying tax, creating jobs, initiating innovation, leveraging our education system to make the country more competitive globally.

I bet there was an entrepreneur behind the it.usaspending.gov site, if you can get something like that up plus a getsatisfaction.com site up for gov.au it would be a nice start

Cheers, Pete.

http://www.peterjcooper.com

http://globalvillagegovernance.blogspot.com/2009/06/something-in-air-time-for-another.html

Another Leonard Cohen quote comes to mind “Democracy is coming, to the USA”

After all, discussion of the “technology” can easily miss the point that it is actually people making technology do things. It is not technology doing it by itself. And the people that are making technology do things that should be heard.

The reason for having an industry rep and/or practical tech experience at the table is that they can do two things:

1. Listen in an observe the processes you rightly propose are the main game ATM. Through this they may help make any industry engagement work better because of their intimate knowledge of how we got to the problems.

This is really just a efficiency in that it can shorten the ‘briefing’ period as the person might come out of the processes you are talking about with some early ideas on the technology paradigms that may be important.

2. By being well versed in the technology, the person might be able to sometimes steer the conversation with some emerging technology in mind. Note, this is not about talking about that technology (although it might). It is more about the subtle difference that can come from having the technologist at the table.

But most important, it is the educational and knowledge transfer properties that can come from having the technologist at the table.

Our world, the web, is all about convergence and it is my experience that great web projects are best served by having the right people at the table.

I have just been through a web 2.0 issue with one of the local ACT Government departments and we were able to solve the issue and find a really great balance by having me, not a technologist as such (I can’t write code to save my life) and the executive work through it. I was able to help them with some of their issues through things like IP tracking, etc, to stop unbalanced views being expressed.

Anyway, I think that the die is cast and we should move on. IT is not so important and, as we can see, I and other industry players already have a seat at the table through this great forum.

Pose another set of thoughts Martin and Co. You can count on me to try to help with my thoughts, for whatever they are worth to the great undertaking you are steering.