David Reevely
At the FWD50 digital government conference, ex-public servant Sean Boots gets a rock-star entrance. A full room for Anita Anand got sparse over a couple of intervening speakers, and now has filled up again.
Nov 6, 2023 at 4:20pmWeb
Show threadDavid ReevelyNov 6, 2023

Boots: The PS is structured so it’s very, very difficult to change. Diffused responsibility, emphasis on consensus, process over outcomes, vaporware.

Clerks of the PCO keep retiring, lamenting the pace of change. Apparently even they don’t have the organizational capital to do things.

Show threadDavid ReevelyNov 6, 2023
Cites a UK report by Martha Lane Fox calling for radical digital change in government. It worked. Go big.
Show threadDavid ReevelyNov 6, 2023
In Canada, we did a lot of the surface stuff but not the underlying change. Much ancient tech AND PROCESSES sitting beneath, says Boots.
Show threadDavid ReevelyNov 6, 2023
Stop doing massive IT projects that don’t really help people, he says. Make big change. Call for things that can’t be nibbled to death.
Show threadDavid ReevelyNov 6, 2023

Hire people from across Canada, he says. Let them work from wherever (applause).

Give workers the tools they need.

Scrap a layer of hierarchy. Have people do stuff, not manage stuff.

Copy Shopify’s model of top people who aren’t management.

Make SSC tools optional, so they have to be chosen.

Put digital people at the top. “Make them deputy ministers.”

Show threadpeter_timusk (he/him/il/lui)Nov 9, 2023
@davidreevely @sboots change? Did we not change in the 1980s and again in the 1990s? Will we not also change in the 2030s? #OpenSourceProgrammingLanguages are a present change we are moving towards. Saving money is one of the main reasons, though we hear words like “modern” . #WereWeEverModern?
Show threadNigelNov 6, 2023
@davidreevely just in case this is for an article for The Logic, I think @sboots is still a public servant, but moved to working for Yukon Gov’t instead of federal gov’t