Thread by @steveparks

@SommetGovTech next session is ‘From Lab to Gov - harnessing the power of innovation’ #GovTechSummit ...

... the panel is:

...Alexandre starts by saying gov must innovate because citizens demand and expect it - they are used to a private sector that is making life easier and more connected. The challenge is how does government go about procuring such innovation?... #GovTechSummit

... he says they have started doing startup hubs that allow small business to experiment and innovate, that later might be ready for a more formal public sector procurement... it creates an ecosystem as well as a supply chain...
#GovTechSummit

... Matt says he is seeking a similar approach in the U.K. He says U.K. has a decade of digital transformation in rest of Gov, andwasn’t sure what response he’d get to bringing it to health. But staff are used to tech in their own lives and are desperate for it... #Govtechsummit

... he says that by the nature of health, the approach to change management is very cautious. While that is right for medical treatments and pharma, it’s not right for tech innovation and there needs to be more agile innovation... #GovTechSummit

... he says it’s a leadership issue. In past people have tried to bring digital change and failed and lost their jobs, bringing more caution. He wants to send message as new minister that he wants to hear about ideas for digital innovation... #Govtechsummit

... his view is that they need to engage startups, but the startups need a change in procurement. He doesn’t think grants are needed, just easier contracts... #govtechsummit

... Stephanie is next, and says that innovation needs a creative environment. The challenge startups have is time and money - so Gov should think what it means when they say the next meeting is in 3 months when startups are trying to establish and survive now #Govtechsummit

... Diego moved from Amazon to Italian government (until recently)... he says Italian Gov is similar to Belgium and U.K.
he echoes that change starts from the top. But it’s really hard to manage change only from within, so he also recruited people from outside... #GovTechSummit

... his main message though is to ‘start with the citizens and work back’ which I think is, essentially, start with user needs...
#Govtechsummit

... Matt says he wants the change to be as large as possible as fast as possible...
Alexandre says their approach has been to avoid big change. Don’t believe vendors who try to sell you big new data warehouse... look for smaller projects to deliver quickly... #GovTechSummit

...he has tried to attract good people to do a five year stint in government to bring the knowledge of how to do this.

Diego says he didn’t bring blockchain or any other fancy tech to government - be brought simple project management #GovTechSummit

...he also brought the concept of an API - every single government service needs to be able to present an API so other services can interact with it. #GovTechSummit

...Matt returns to scale of change, and says while the overall change that needs to be delivered should be ambitious, the individual projects within that should be small and deliverable. In past a small Gov team would hand a big contract to a big systems integrator #GovTechSummit

...now government should do more in-house on that programme of work, and engage commercially on smaller clearer pieces of work.
Alexandre says when you go fast you also need to make sure you bring everyone with you so no citizens are left behind...
#GovTechSummit

...Diego says that also, it’s not that you’re going from a perfect offline Gov service to a digital one - you also have to rethink service that needs to be provided.
Matt says he doesn’t want these notes of caution to give excuses to people that want to stop change
#GovTechSummit

Discussion next on what the panel will see as success...
Matt: when I’m no longer the legal owner of the world’s largest collection of fax machines. But actually he says he wants to resist setting an endpoint - it’s continuous improvement...
#Govtechsummit

...Alexandre: I’m always careful not to set the target as saving costs, it generally doesn’t happen and also demotivates people. Instead the target should be improving things, making services better...
#Govtechsummit

...Stephanie: success is when Europeans entrepreneurs don’t turn to the US, they look to grow in Europe. But also governments should create platforms that companies can then offer services on and citizens can choose services #Govtechsummit

...Diego: what he learned from Amazon it’s about reducing time - citizens want it to be faster and easier to deal with government
Matt: government Services are not competing with each other across borders so we can learn from each other and share

#GovTechSummit

...Alexandre says he is optimistic because tech has brought new people into the public sector - entrepreneurs, technologists. That new influx of talent makes him very optimistic.

#govtechsummit

...Diego: yes, if you ask young person now if they’d work for gov for 2-3 years on a specific tech project they are likely to say yes.
Stephanie: she’s learned that it’s about collaboration. They started out building everything themselves - now they find other tech to integrate..

....and that’s the end of the panel on harnessing the power of innovation.

Going into a coffee break now, and a chance to practice my French. Mange tout!
#GovTechSummit