How we use Visual Thinking approaches to design Digital Government Services that are focused on user needs?

At GovCrate, we use visual thinking approaches to focus our teams on delivering services that address users needs and to facilitate greater collaboration and understanding. This is especially critical when designing digital government services because the design of these services requires team members from the different disciplines that make up the governance stack (Legal, Policy, Operations and Technology). These team members need a common language to collaborate efficiently and effectively. Because of this we developed a visual thinking methodology that has allowed us to quickly and easily get team members speaking the same language. It’s an unorthodox application of the visual thinking approach but it’s use is critical for us in building up highly effective and efficient multi-disciplinary teams that actually deliver services that focus on user needs.

Digital transformation in Pacific Governments

Many government agencies departments in the Pacific still paper based processes despite decades of advancements in information technology. These processes are based on ink and paper based technology and are used to manage large swaths of public sector systems. This leads to manual work that is inefficient, ineffective, and susceptible to corruption. It ensures that Pacific economies will continue to fall behind other countries in an increasingly competitive globalized environment 🌎. Addressing these issues and pain points will require resources to be invested (i.e. time, money, capacity, technology, and social networks).

What is the Governance Cube?

We developed a framework called the governance cube a few years ago to help multi disciplinary teams build a common understanding of government systems. It looks at government systems as having 3 dimensions. These dimensions are:

Governance Domain: these are the places where constraints can be imposed on a system to influence the behaviour of the entities operating within it;

Governance Functions: these are the tasks that are carried out by governments to ensure the entities adhere to the rules;

Governed Entities: these are the entities whose behaviour we are trying to govern.

Navigating Digital Government Transformation: POC, Prototype, Pilot, and MVP Explained

Understanding the stages of POC, Prototype, Pilot, and MVP is essential in the context of digital government. Each stage serves a specific purpose, helping to ensure that digital initiatives are viable, user-friendly, compliant, and effective. By recognizing the unique challenges and opportunities at each stage, government entities can navigate the digital transformation journey more effectively, leading to successful implementation and adoption of digital solutions.

Revolutionizing DeFi with Chainlink’s CCIP: A New Era for Liquidity Pools

CCIP’s most significant contribution to DeFi is the introduction of universal liquidity pools. Traditionally, DeFi applications operate with separate liquidity pools on each blockchain, leading to a fragmented liquidity landscape. CCIP turns this paradigm on its head by enabling liquidity to be shared across different blockchains. This cross-chain liquidity unification means assets are more freely accessible, leading to increased market fluidity and creating a more integrated DeFi ecosystem.

Rent if You Can, Buy if You Can’t, and Build if You Must: Navigating Technology Investment

“Rent if you can, buy if you can’t, and build if you must” is a heuristic that simplifies the decision-making process for technology investment. By understanding the nuances of each option, businesses can make informed choices that align with their strategic goals, ensuring they remain competitive and agile in a digital-first world.

How to a digital identity service that preserves user privacy using zero-knowledge proofs (ZKPs).

Blockchain technology provides a decentralized platform where information can be stored securely and immutably. It also allows for the creation of unique digital identities that can be verified without the need for a central authority. Zero-knowledge proofs are a cryptographic method that enables one party to prove to another party that a statement is true … Read more

What is innovation accounting and how does it help manage innovation?

‘Innovation Accounting’ is a loose term for the idea that organisations need new metrics to manage innovation, the dominant competitive force driving value today. After building a few government as a service platforms the only thing I’ve seen reliably produce valuable innovation is intentional and consistent experimentation. Increasingly many teams are practicing some form of … Read more

Innovation Options: A tool for governments to help structure Investments into Innovation

Innovation is a key driver of economic growth and social progress, and governments around the world are increasingly looking for new ways to encourage innovation and investment. One emerging tool that is gaining attention is innovation options, a financial instrument that provides a financial incentive for private sector partners to invest in new technologies or … Read more

What are sense making frameworks and why are they important to e-Government strategy?

Sense making via an elephant

Different people have different perspectives. We need a way to bring all the different perspectives together. To do this we need to establish a set of common sense making frameworks to build a common understanding of what is going on.