Previous page: What went wrong with G2TT
But his assumption was wrong. Although the G2TT executive took great pains to clear the initiative from legal, ethical and public affairs perspectives, and made it clear they would not pursue questions of policy, there's nevertheless a culture of control in government, he says.
"Some supervisors didn't like the fact that they didn't have control over the agenda, who could be nominated to the group and so on. Even if you only hear about one or two instances of supervisors objecting, it's a chilling factor. No one wants to antagonize their supervisor, even if they're not doing anything wrong technically."
Some of the negative reaction may have stemmed from a misperception about staff loyalties, he speculates. "This was not a forum for disgruntled employees, and we set that out clearly in the charter. But some supervisors believe their people are supposed to provide advice within their own agencies or departments - advice which is supposed to be privileged - and then they see them participate in a public forum. But in our people's minds, there was a clear distinction between what was confidential and what could be shared."
For these reasons, the Web site was shut down by the G2TT executive itself, he says. "No one commanded its shutdown; no one said it was an unethical initiative or anything like that. It was more subtle than that - but subtle is sometimes all you need. We decided conditions weren't right for something like G2TT to flourish."
Over a year after the shutdown, the government climate is slightly warmer but some essential ingredients are still missing, says Cormier. He notes there's a lot of talk about Web 2.0 and its possibilities to improve government nowadays, but nothing tangible has been put forward.
"There's a lot of visionary stuff but nothing's concrete," he says. "The government isn't actively encouraging submissions of proposals on a specific set of dates and then committing to screening for the best. You only need one person to monitor those submissions and establish a dialogue with interested parties, and one person in the whole of government isn't hard to do."
Nevertheless, Cormier believes change will inevitably come to government as Web 2.0, social media and other collaborative technologies become mainstream in the near future. "I still believe in the idea," he says.
The G2TT Web site still exists although it's offline, and Cormier says he's set up a corporation called G2TT Incorporated as a consultancy. G2TT was a new creature which didn't fit preconceived notions of how a government advisory group should operate, he says. "But people know consulting and how it works, so we can promote the same idea differently now."
Cormier's recipe for Web 2.0 success:
To create an environment that nurtures Web 2.0 solutions to common problems in government, Cormier believes these three ingredients, based on open source principles, are essential:
- The government needs to actively encourage this collaborative approach. "There's a big difference between tolerating and supporting an initiative," he says. "We would need a statement inside government that it not only supports but encourages this approach. The only way to counter inertia is if it's clear there's upper management support."
- The statement should state clearly that the reports will be considered. "It must state who will review and consider them, be it the CIO Council, central agencies or whoever is selected. It's not a commitment to act on them or change anything, just a statement that the reports will get read and considered."
- A Web 2.0-friendly IT environment in which to operate
Rosie Lombardi is a Toronto-based freelance writer. Contact her at rosie@rosie-lombardi.com
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