Monthly Archives: November 2008

Sea Monkey or Seahorse: Which Are You in Times of Crisis?

Over the course of this week I had the opportunity to visit with a wide variety of executives. They ranged from leaders of multi-billion dollar enterprises to emerging entrepreneurs. What struck me most was the polarization of attitudes across two distinct camps, namely the “sea monkeys” versus the “seahorses”. Monkey Sea, Monkey Do Sea MonkeysRead… Read more »

Harvard Update on Food Safety/Security

Hi, all – We’ve been working with regulators and industry over the past several months to figure out some high value, low cost, best next moves on the nation’s food safety issues. Topmost is getting the traceback during outbreak investigations fixed – make it faster and more accurate. Our status update is here, and aRead… Read more »

Is e-government a dangerous enthusiasm?

Yes, according to the conclusion reached by Gauld, Goldfinch and Dale* after a number of e-government case studies in New Zealand and a survey of wider literature. And it is an interesting judgement in case of New Zealand, a country with 4 million population, but well advanced in e-government. By mid-1990s most New Zealand governmentRead… Read more »

GovLoop’s Bureaucrat on Sports – AP Top 25 NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision – Ohio State – Michigan Week (and other picks)

The rich tradition, the power, the suspense… yes, it’s Virginia Tech vs. Duke week… the Hokies will be Runnin’ with the Devil!! Oh yeah, it’s Ohio State/Michigan week, too, GovLoopers!!! Friends, relatives, spouses, boyfriends, girlfriends, etc. will war with each other this week!! What do we want to do? We want to make some picks….Read… Read more »

Pounding the Podium (And God bless you too Ted)

Raindrops on rock. If we wash the hard rock of positions with the rain of ideas and solutions, we can change the paradigm of political conversation from the shouting of slogans and sound bites to serious consideration of facts (we each have our own,) interests, and possible solutions in a context where consideration is possible.Read… Read more »

Packed House at 11/20 Public Communication Roundtable

Yesterday morning I attended a SRO Public Communication event put on by the Federal Consulting Group and GovDelivery. Over 120 government PA Officers and IT and Web Managers came to hear how agencies are using new digital channels and automated email alerts to better share their content with the public. We heard from a panelRead… Read more »

Bridges 2.0: how applying Web 2.0 tools — and attitudes — to public works can cut costs and contribute to economic recovery

I had an op-ed in Engineering News Record, the “bible” of the engineering and construction industry, this week, dealing with what I call “Bridges 2.O,” how using Web 2.0 tools such as wikis and structured data feeds, and, equally important, the Web 2.0 ethos of collaboration, can revolutionize public works projects. As I point out,Read… Read more »

Mainstreaming

Seems to me like this little economic crisis thing may just propel our profession into an organic change of its own. For some time I’ve thought that the next evolution for HR will be to displace responsibility to operational management. Said differently, that we enable others to do for themselves what we’ve been doing forRead… Read more »

Focus on Learning for Organizational Success

December 8-11 2008 / Washington DC (link) “The hottest trends in e-Learning are the use of social networks and other collaborative tools, and the explosion of Immersive Learning Simulations (ILS) and Serious Games. These technologies offer huge potentials, but also thorny challenges, for achieving new levels of learner engagement, collaboration and performance improvement. But nowRead… Read more »