Now that a whole lot of agency.gov/open websites are live and many agencies have indeed set up a ”mechanism for the public to [...] [p]rovide input on the agency’s Open Government Plan” it’s time to figure out what to watch out for over the coming weeks and months in order to evaluate the success of these initiatives.
As I noted back in January, my hope is that these new projects will address and improve upon three key issues that we saw during last year’s Open Government Dialogue (namely, lack of convener involvement, insufficient moderation, herding).
All in all, I’ll keep an eye on the following (in no particular order):
- Expectation management: Is the agency clear about the scope of their participation initiative and their promise to the public? Do participants know what impact they can reasonably expect and when?
- Community ground rules: Every agency should have these “rules of engagement” in place and be ready to enforce them if needed. Bonus points for friendly, easy-to-understand language!
- Level of convener involvement/participation: Does the agency become actively engaged in the discussions?
- Quality of moderation: Will the agency manage to keep discussions on topic and moderate distractions in a fair but timely manner?
- Quantity of participation over time: How many participants will sign up? How much content will they produce? (luckily, IdeaScale exposes a few basic metrics in real time, such as number of ideas, comments, votes and registered users)
- Outreach and diversity of participants: Does the agency manage to attract a broad range of participants from various backgrounds? Or do usual suspects dominate the discussions?
- Conclusion and impact: This one will be especially interesting as there doesn’t seem to be an end date defined for any of these initiatives. In case of ongoing participation programs, does the agency at least share interim results? Looks like this effort is scheduled to go through March 19, 2010.
- Tech support: Does the agency address technical support questions and resolve any issues in a timely manner?
- Project communications: Does the agency offer ways for participants to stay in the loop (or get up to speed quickly) with regard to current state of the discussion, frequently asked questions, highlights, interim results, next steps etc.?
- Mood: Overall, how happy is everyone with the process? What’s the energy level? Are things productive? Etc.
What else should be on the radar? Sound off in the comments.
Related posts:
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Does it promote and encourage disparate groups of users/followers to join together in a shared space in order to collaborate on a shared goal – e.g mash 2 data streams to create a 3rd?
Does it host these shared spaces?
Does it actively encourage education and learning, and maybe host peer-to-peer learning?
How granular are the user-controls in terms of “follow this item”?
Can I follow just a distinct idea/data-set’s progress/conversation – and what options do I have to do that, rss? email?
Cross-posted on GovLoop: http://www.govloop.com/profiles/blogs/ten-things-to-monitor-as
This was another insightful post. While a few of these ideas may be obvious, there’s something new in that list for everyone– well done.
I made sure we’re linking here from the list of resources that the agency folks will use when they’re in the February Open Government Directive Workshop: http://opengovdirective.pbworks.com/Resources-for-Creating-an-Open-Government-Plan
Manual trackback: http://opengovernmentdirections.org/2010/02/07/10-things-to-monitor-with-agency-online-dialogues/
Hi Tim,
Good list, but I’d suggest that it is a bit heavy on the functional side of agency performance, and a bit light on the value of what agencies are actually producing. Jim Harper at CATO has posted an interesting piece evaluating agencies on the basis whether the data released by agencies provide insight into agency management, deliberations, or results.
http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2010/02/05/grading-agencies-high-value-data-sets/
It is a good read and offers a valuable counterpoint to your efforts.
Cheers,
Doug Ward
http://www.opengovblog.us
@Doug
Thanks for the comment!
My list addresses the quality of the ongoing e-consultations only, not any of the other elements included in the Open Government Directive (e.g. the data sets that have been released).
My question is: how well are agencies implementing the required ”mechanism for the public to [...] [p]rovide input on the agency’s Open Government Plan” and what can we learn for future projects of this sort.
Hope that clarifies.
Correction: Looks like these online consultations are scheduled to run through March 19, 2010 (so they do have an end date, which is good).
Monitoring 10 things is a tangible goal. Since there are 26 Federal Agencies all with differing missions, You will want to consider 10 ways each Agency transforms their way of doing business as a result of the Open Government Directive.
Then from there, 10 benefits to the public after each of these evaluations go through being monitored. Good start to keep a keen watch on Open Government.
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