LocalGov Digital Voice

VITAL DATA: What every comms person needs to know about the Ofcom communications market report 2018

We will look back at 2007 as being a year when the world went in a new direction and communicators struggled to keep up. In January that year, Apple’s iphone, Google’s Android and BBC’s iPlayer were all launched. Tom Baldwin in his book ‘Control, Alt, Delete’ singles out the pivotal year of 2007 as the […]

30 days of human comms #55: the firefighters who told a girl she COULD be a firefighter, too

Human comms is simply an organisation talking in a human voice. Sometimes it is planned but often it is responding with a human voice to something which has happened. So, bravo West Midlands Fire Service for responding to a tweet from a girl who didn’t think she could be a firefighter with video… of female […]

Improving energy services for people living in vulnerable situations

How can the market help such a diverse group?Anybody can find themselves in a situation where they’re less able to represent their interests, or are more likely to suffer detriment, than a typical consumer.Examples could be people living on low incomes, pensioners, single parents or people who live in rural areas. In energy markets, these situations […]

Seeds to Trees – Vulnerability as the birthplace

Extract from Presence: Exploring Profound Change in People, Organizations and Society by Betty Sue Flowers, C. Otto Scharmer, Joseph Jaworski, Peter M. Senge I take joy from moments when things connect to create clarity of a bigger and more complex picture. The picture above which talks about the seeds being a gateway for trees to […]

A new search

In mid-September last year, we added a new search engine to the public website. Our existing search wasn’t very good. In fact, at times, it was downright awful. So this was a priority piece of work to get live to make sure that customers could find content quickly. We ended up adding a Cludo search […]

Development and Growth – A perspective on vulnerability

Leading inevitably involves trying to effect significant changes It is very hard to bring about significant changes in any human group without changes in individual behaviours. It is very hard to sustain significant changes in behaviour without significant changes in individuals’ underlying meanings that may give rise to their behaviours It is very hard to […]

#weeknotes S03 EP02

New signings and the user experience of running a small business… #weeknotes S03 EP02 – week ending 13 January 2019 This was the first proper working week of the new year for me and I wanted to clear the decks of a lot of admin things – the stuff I don’t really like getting into. […]

New year, slightly better me

Photo by Ross Findon on UnsplashI’ve always thought New Years Eve was a weird thing. I’m an introvert so naturally dislike the idea of enforced large-scale merriment. I’m also short (really short) so a crowded nye pub ends up being an endurance test where I spend the evening trying not to have my eyes poked out […]

On being deliberately developmental

I share this and invite reflections on what you think and feel about the space that Ray describes as a work environment?  

1.6 million people will move onto Universal Credit this year — but urgent changes are needed

1.6 million people will move onto Universal Credit this year — but urgent changes are needed to make it work for themDespite changes made to Universal Credit and delays to rollout, more changes are neededAmber Rudd, the new Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, is expected to announce further changes to Universal Credit, building on her ambition to […]

Just say no

LGSS Digital Blog Service design for local government Alan Ward Lead Developer Just say no (things I’ve learnt becoming Lead Developer at LGSS Digital) We’ve all been there. Someone walks up and has a problem that needs fixing there and then. It’s crazy urgent and if it’s not fixed in the next 5 minutes, it […]

#weeknotes S03 EP01

It’s back to work we go… #weeknotes S03 EP01 – week ending 6 January 2019 It’s the first #weeknotes of 2019 so this one’s likely to be short as I’ve only gone back to work fully today. Taking a full break over the two weeks of Christmas was definitely the right thing to do – […]

POLLING LINES: Some updated social media purdah guidelines

Speaking at the HQN Housing Network Event

Written by Angeline Saunderson-Hill & Dave FergusonThe Housing Management NetworkIt may not be the best way to start your back to work week following a holiday but that’s how it was to be. We had been invited to address the HQN national conference around the theme of ‘Customer Service in the Digital Age ’. This followed […]

University cloud at pace

Zoom, zoom, zoom… Good things come in threes and Birmingham City University (BCU) has just delivered three significant projects in record time. All in the cloud. What can we learn from that? Firstly we have learned that complex changes can be delivered quickly if you focus on the minimum viable product. Secondly, cloud solutions and […]

Contacting Citizens Advice was too difficult — here’s how we’ve made it easier

Using our ‘Contact us’ pages was too difficult — here’s how we’ve made it easierConnecting people to the help they needIf you’ve ever tried to get in touch with Citizens Advice, you might have come across the old ‘Contact us’ section of our website. If you did, you probably noticed that it was messy, sprawling and confused.Feedback told us […]

Reflecting back on 2018

A new year is always a time of reflection for me. Especially in that week between Christmas and the new year. Although I had that time off of work this year, that didn’t stop me thinking about the year just gone. And when I got back to work this week, I was eager to look […]

Ten years on Twitter. (Almost.)

Lots of folk are celebrating 10 year Twitter birthdays round about now. I’ve not quite reached that milestone — it took until May 2009 for me to be convinced that Twitter wasn’t just people swapping pics of their breakfast.But, in my usual contrary way, I’ve decided not to wait until May to celebrate my Twitterversary. So, here […]

Weirdos in the workplace

LGSS Digital Blog Service design for local government Will Wise Senior Developer Weirdos in the workplace – how to get the most out of your team In the workplace, you come across many strange people. I would know, I am one. But problems can sometimes arise when trying to lead people with strange quirks that […]

Hello 2019

After yesterday’s round-up and reflection of my 2018 today we’re at the year’s reset point and 1 January 2019 is upon us. I don’t really do resolutions (Matt Essam makes excellent reasons why you shouldn’t either) but I do set goals and take action toward them – and at New Year I like to set […]

Prototype! What’s the worst that can happen?

LGSS Digital Blog Service design for local government Adele Gilpin Digital Business Analyst Prototype! What’s the worst that can happen? Over the past few weeks there have been fantastic blogs from my colleagues Sam and Mitchell about psychological safety and breaking through the silos. I was struck by how well they complemented each other – […]

Change is good

As 2018 ends, we’re heading into the final quarter of the Digital First programme as it’s currently set up here, and inevitably there have been lots of changes since we started. The council is working out how it wants this work to be delivered in the future and, while that’s not yet confirmed, what is definite is that there won’t be a […]