(5/9/2007) Terrorism, escalating crime and illegal immigration have pushed the British government closer to dropping a tight electronic curtain over its borders. Scheduled for implementation over the next seven years, Britain is testing several technologies as part of its "e-Borders" program, which aims for more thorough oversight over travelers coming to the U.K. | (5/9/2007) Speaking with Art Stevenson, the theme of collaboration keeps on popping up. There's a reason for this, as senior writer Lisa Williams discovered in conversation with one of Canada's most renowned senior public administrators. There's no science about collaboration, and there's often no sign where it might lead. As the founding executive director of the Commonwealth Association for Public Administration and Management, and currently executive director of the Institute for Citizen-Centred Service, Stevenson looks back on an extensive career grounded in the right mix of people skills, financial and IT management, and good governance. | (5/3/2007) Edmonton is an oddity. It is one of the few cities in North America that is systematically tackling public engagement. In 2005, the City started up the Office of Public Involvement (OPI) to reshape the dynamics of municipal politics. "The overall goal is to change the culture of the city so that public involvement becomes a part of our day-to-day business," says coordinator Jill Bradford-Green. | (5/3/2007) A decision by the Ontario government to ban access to Facebook for staffers from their computers has been deemed a knee-jerk reaction by experts in the social networking field. However, it appears the Ontario government hasn't completely thought this through, suggests Dan Latendre, CIO and technology officer for the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI). | (5/3/2007) Citizens who are dissatisfied with Ontario's electoral system will have their say this fall. Inspired by British Columbia's experiment in 2004, Ontario followed suit in 2006 by convening a Citizens' Assembly for the first time in its history. Randomly selected, 103 citizens were canvassed to study the intricacies of electoral systems and make recommendations for reform. | (5/2/2007) The nanny state's days are numbered. For over a century, government's top-down approach has created a culture of control and programmed public expectations that the state is responsible for solving society's problems. There are many complex social problems today that can't be solved by issuing edicts from office towers in Ottawa. Obesity, racism, economic sustainability: these are issues that need to be tackled communally by diverse players at all levels to change attitudes and behaviour. | (5/2/2007) A new wiki designed to track and allow users to comment on pending federal legislation has been launched. The site allows lawmakers, lobbyists, trade association officials and others with expertise on specific subjects to update wiki entries on pending federal legislation. The public can also add comments on legislation. | (5/2/2007) Politicians should be more creative decision-makers, instead of bureaucratic, according to the director of e-government at the Fraunhofer Institute for Open Communication Systems in Berlin, Germany. There is a need for seamless process in the delivery of e-government services across all levels, but the challenge to this process is bureaucracy, Michael Tschichholz said in his keynote address yesterday to delegates at the 2007 Lac Carling Congress at Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ont. | (5/1/2007) Wayne Bossert, senior vice-president of service delivery with RBC Royal Bank, introduces delegates at the 2007 Lac Carling Congress to the bank's transformational mantra, "Always earning the right to be our client's first choice." Read how RBC overcame a flat trend in client loyalty by dealing with competing priorities and organizational silos, challenges all too familiar to the public sector. | (5/1/2007) For many years, governments world-wide have delivered service to their citizens through a business model characterized by multiple policy departments with siloed programs. The new citizen-centred model developed by Service Canada focuses on people rather than programs, with four defining concepts: focusing on the citizen; delivering one-stop government service; integrating citizen information; and collaboration and partnership. |
  | |  | | Blog Spotlight: Sandford Borins |  | As Professor of Strategic Management at the University of Toronto, Sandford Borins brings InterGovWorld.com readers exclusive insights into how and why the public sector is changing. You'll find new perspectives and questions, observations and objectives, lessons and answers. Cover to Cover, the blog by Prof. Sandford Borins, appears every Thursday. Inside Cover to Cover | |
| | | Unified Communications |  | Unity is a word often heard in the public sector, with myriad agencies and departments looking to foster collective thinking around some of today's most pressing issues. The word, however, doesn't usually get mentioned in the same breath as technology. That's a situation, though, that might soon be changing, thanks to a new software platform known as unified communications.
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