We have made ‘embedding digital’ a new clear objective for the digital communications team this year. In the past we have approached this in different ways – offering innovative solutions to publishing documents, taking the conversation to where our audience hang out on line, and looking at third parties to deliver content. Now we need to focus our energy and formalise plans to embed digital within the rest of the…
All central government departments and most other public bodies, are subject to Cabinet Office spending controls. For digital service delivery, there is a zero threshold, meaning any new or re-designed transactional services delivered on-line or new websites or applications, need to be approved at the proposition stage and before any expenditure is committed. In addition, when creating or purchasing digital products or services other spending controls, such as ICT expenditure and strategic…
The Task In Autumn 2012, the BIS Science & Society team started a review of our programme and objectives. As a team, we spend around £13 million a year, part of an allocation set out in the Science and Research Budget, on a number of activities centred around increasing engagement with science and research. The review was prompted by two things: a requirement from the Cabinet Office to review the…
The task In July 2012 BIS launched a consultation on modernising and simplifying consumer law on the supply of goods, services and digital content. As a policy area that affects everyone in the UK, this was a huge task. In fact that was the problem – it was, in a very literal sense, a very big consultation, running to 101 detailed policy questions spread over a massive 221 pages. We…
I made a New Year’s resolution to be more active on Twitter – properly following and engaging with people (rather than just my geeky @bengoldacre crush) and not be a passive observer dipping in and out. 3 months in – what do I think? As a civil servant I am struggling to promote policy or engage in policy debates using my own Twitter account. It feels weird actively promoting policy…
BIS published it’s Digital Strategy in December setting out how it will redesign its services around the needs of users in order to be digital-by-default – with online services so good that those who can get online, choose to use them. One of the key commitments in the strategy is to assess the digital demand (scale and complexity) and capability across BIS and partner organisations. A challenging commitment given the…
Colleagues from the MET Office visited BIS to share their experiences of social media and the benefits it brings when handling big news like Hurricane Katia:
I don’t know about you, but I hate having to work too hard online. I expect to quickly find answers via search, or I browse my preferred social networks or forums for advice. Based on the sort of figures we see for people accessing BIS content, others behave the same. Really useful content or high profile news gets lots of views, because it always appears high in search. Stuff that…
Recently I was at Google’s London HQ in Soho for an event called Digital Citizen 2013 organised by the Government Communications Network (GCN). As you might expect there was some slightly wacky stuff involved: doors designed to look like they came from the yellow submarine; funky retro furniture in the break out area; even a You Tube video of a skateboarding dog! But beneath the seeming frivolity the presenters from…
Today we’ve just launched the first in our BIS Science & Innovation podcast series. From ginger genes to celebrating science marks an experiment for us, and a step away from our more event-centred use of Audioboo where we’re trying to capture immediate reactions and flavours from events such as the Big Bang Fair or the Manufacturing Summit. Instead, the aim here is for each edition of the podcast to open up what happens…