The web is chock-full of amazing articles and resources to help people in their digital transformation efforts.
But there is so much out there, it’s hard to know where to look! We curate the best of what we see here in the library, picking out the gems that will really help folk in local public services.
5-Year Blueprint for Community of Practice
“Most blog posts about communities of practice cover the first couple of years. I had the unusual chance to lead one for six (the product management profession at the Ministry of Justice). That gave me a front-row seat to how…
Most of What We Call a ‘Service’ Isn’t One
“In government and the wider public sector, we’ve built our identity around “services.”Digital teams design them, measure them, apply the Service Standard to them. But most of what we call a service isn’t actually a service. More often, the work we label…
All policy constrains good action, as well as bad
“Organisational policy is an important tool. It can help organisations be compliant, teams to behave consistently, and employees to understand what’s expected of them. But it’s also fundamentally limiting in character: all policy acts to constrain people’s actions in some…
What the NHS Single Patient Record can learn from India’s Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission
“Part of India’s National Health Authority, the Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission was founded in 2021 to design, build, operate and scale digital public infrastructure for India’s health system. Among the products and platforms it is responsible for are the Unified Health Interface, which…
Six alternatives to traditional top down public service delivery
Many councils have made it this far by cutting back on their existing model of public service delivery – in some cases right to the bone. But what do they do when all the incremental cuts that can be made…
Creating better acceptance criteria for user stories
“Acceptance criteria (ACs) are a key part of user stories. They set the boundaries of what should be achieved – telling the developer when to stop, the QA how to test, and the product owner what to expect. Because they’re…
What a digital organisation looks like
“There’s been a lot of work to define what a good digital service looks like (see for example the government’s Digital Service Standard). It’s less obvious what to do if you want to make your whole organisation digital, and there…
What’s wrong with business cases
Business cases are lies. Not wilful lies usually, but they end up with the same results: misleading, misinforming and hiding reality. An archived PDF of this page can be downloaded if the original is inaccessible.
New Operating Models for Local Government – Understanding the Variables
“Importantly, I want to emphasise that exploring new operating models entails fundamentally rethinking the role of a local authority and what it’s uniquely placed to do for its community.” An archived PDF of this page can be downloaded if the…
INVEST in Good Stories, and SMART Tasks
“A pidgin language is a simplified language, usually used for trade, that allows people who can’t communicate in their native language to nonetheless work together. User stories act like this. We don’t expect customers or users to view the system…