My thoughts on the bilingual issue holding back the use of social media in government

I want to make a few things clear before I write this post today.

First of all, I was born in France, I love Quebec here in Canada, I am a trilingual anglophone, and I have nothing but full support for our country having two official languages. That being said, there are certain exceptions in regards to the bilingual requirement, which I think our Treasury Board should consider.

First and foremost, the whole point of effective use of social media is defeated when blog posts, podcasts, rss feeds, etc…, have to be translated each and every single time something is posted. This renders instant response impossible, and will make government organizations seem out-of-date and behind the loop (not that the perception out there is any better now). The translation departments are backlogged enough as is having to translate every single document that exists within each branch. Government websites (aside from a few exceptions) have become warehouses of useless information because it’s become too much of a hassle to make a change, have it approved, send it to translation, send it to the web guys, etc… you know the drill.

Along comes the Web 2.0 revolution of instant sharing, collaboration, and conversation and what does the government do? First of all the provincial government bans Facebook. Smart move guys! That’ll teach ‘em! (i’m being blatantly sarcastic here ->See my post on that issue). Now the government has put a hold on the use of blogs and participation in online social networks because everything that comes out of the government must be bilingual! So if someone working for the government had a departmental or work blog (as is widely prevalent in the U.S –> see my post on Secretary of State Mike Leavitt), and had to respond to reader comments, they “theoretically” would have to send it to translation and wait days if not weeks before they could post. Does that make a lot of sense to you?

How about the case of a “what’s new” rss feed. The purpose is of course to have feeds delivered instantaneously and automatically to subscribers as they are published in response to daily or weekly activities. By the time it’s sent to translation and approved, the message will be out of date. Further still, the whole point of blogging and social networks is 2-way conversation. How is that possible if there are no responses to the comments that would be coming in from active citizens (as a result of the translation delay)? Aren’t government employees supposed to be serving the public (i.e. “public servants”)?

If you work for the government, you’re probably asking, who has the time for all of this anyway? I hear your pain. Unfortunately your excuse is not valid. There are enough social media tools out there (feed readers, auto blog writers, alerts, etc…) that can drastically streamline and speed up your daily tasks ten-fold! Think of all the time that would be freed up if all employees were taught how to effectively use a feed reader (allowing them to unsubscribe from all their newsletters and reduce email reading time), use internal chats for communication instead of email, use internal social networks for collaboration and project work instead of meetings… the list goes on.

You’re probably thinking that sounds expensive? You’re wrong. It’s pennies compared to the alternatives the government spends money on instead. What is expensive is the cost of not embracing social media and ignoring the social (not just technological) revolution taking place.

What’s the solution?

Create a policy for all social media use in government to be “open” to whatever language someone feels comfortable writing in. If citizens want to comment in French, that’s fine…someone should answer them in French. If they comment in English, answer in English. Create an open platform of bilingualism, not a one-way bilingual communication vehicle. Blogs are not supposed to be press releases or “communication pieces” as the government likes to call them.

Citizens deserve the right to dialogue with the government in a free and open manner. Why keep those channels closed? Why block the vastly superiour communication technologies and networks that your young workforce (and “progressive” older workforce) has grown up with and mastered? I’ve said this before and I will say it again, employees that choose to waste time, will waste time regardless of what restrictions you put on them. Instead of banning social media, why not figure out how to use it to your advantage?

My point here is that the TBO should adapt it’s guidelines and policies on bilingualism with modern best practices. Not ancient Web 1.0 thinking, where the web is seen as a storage of digitized static information where everything needs to be finely polished and reviewed by the communication department.

The one exception to all of this that I see is the use of social media tools to gather information on citizens (e.g Facebook Polls). Here it should be bilingual since time-sensitivity is not necessarily a factor and official research should be conducted in both French and English. The good news is that Facebook will soon be updating some of it’s tools (such as Facebook Polls) for French audiences, so hopefully there will be no more excuses in that regard…

A lot of you may disagree, I want to hear your thoughts, let’s open this one up…

The Canadian Government Awakens to social media - forget the buzzwords, it’s time for action!

What a week. I must say I haven’t been so excited and engulfed with new public sector social media developments in a while. First of all, I have noticed an influx of articles, reports and network formation in this field. It must have something to do with the “Fall” season and everyone getting back in their game in preparation for what looks to be a landmark year for government service-delivery in a Web 2.0 era.
Here are some things I learned this week:

1. The Federal government has created an official, inter-departmental, cross-functional team of consultants, managers and directors to come up with a Social Media government engagement strategy. While, to many this may sound like just another stagnant bureaucratic, process-focused team that will lead to nothing, I beg to differ.Why? let’s just say I met some of the team members at a presentation I was giving to the Public Service Commission this week and there is nothing stagnant about them. Many come from the private sector and they are interested in obtaining results, FAST. I’m looking forward to hearing and especially seeing more from them soon.
2. I think it’s safe to say that Web 2.0 has now officially passed the “buzz-word” stage in government communications and marketing departments. There are no more blank stares and/or surprised eyes when I mention things like Facebook, LinkedIn, Blogs, etc… during presentations. Most of our clients are aware of the rapidly evolving online landscape, if not through their own use, then through their kids use! It has finally come down to the “action” stage from more than just the early adopters. They want to act now and many are experimenting on their own. Try searching for “Canadian Government” in Facebook and see for yourself)
3. Blogging by program managers and directors working for the government will soon (i.e. 200 be very prevalent. This is not to be confused with the one-way PR “bullshit” that often comes out in press releases, or one-way static HTML senior executive web sites with the word “BLOG” written on them as a title and fake entries sounding like they came out of a constipated robot.
4. Monthly social media community gatherings are popping up in both large and small cities all over the world. For those interested, here in Ottawa we have a meetup group called “Third Tuesday“. The largest social media gathering is still PodCamp Boston (in it’s second year), which has spawned scaled down PodCamp’s all over the world. People are genuinely interested in sharing, collaborating and learning this evolving field together. My prediction is that these general social media conferences/meetings will soon branch off into industry specific groups with very specific shared goals.
5. Finally, interesting articles and reports are coming in from all angles. Here’s some that you can download from my FTP:

• Newsletter from Public Works and Government Service Canada (PWGSC) showing some interesting blog developments.
• For even more inspiration, read about some international government blogging developments as stated in this IBM Government Blogging Report.

Some humour to close off…

10 Tips for Blogging by Public Sector Executives

I was recently kindly provided with a great research report on Government Blogging authored by David C. Wyld, from the Department of Management at Southeastern Louisiana University.

After reading pretty much the entire 99 page document, I thought one of the most valuable take-aways it offered (in addition to the plethora of great diagrams and statistics) was the section providing the Top 10 tips for public sector executives wishing to start a Blog.

As a result I decided it would be a good idea to post this Top 10 list on my blog , since it is relevant to all of you that work in the Public Sector. While the majority of the report dealt with best practices in the U.S government blogosphere, naturally the same tips apply here in Canada. Again, I want to reiterate that these tips were taken from David C. Wyld’s report (I do not want to take credit for them):

Tip 1: Define yourself and your purpose. In 1992, Ross Perot’s running mate was vice Admiral James Stockdale, a vietnam War hero and former prisoner of war,. At the vice presidential debate, he infamously began with the rhetorical questions: “Who am I? Why am I here?” (Holmes, 2005). While these questions didn’t lead to victory for Stockdale, they can for you. You should, at least mentally but perhaps in your first post, state the reasons you are starting your blog, what you hope to do with it, who you hope will read it, and so on.

Tip 2: Do it yourself! Do not have someone else write your blog. While you may enlist assistance for any technical aspects that you feel uncomfortable with (and with the blogging tools available today, this really should not be an issue), you must be the author to make it authentic and interesting to your audience.

Tip 3: Make a time commitment. Before you begin your blog, know that you must make a personal commitment to have the time available to not only regularly post to your blog, but to read and respond to comments made on it. And if the comment section is managed, you or perhaps a subordinate must make decisions on which comments will be posted on the blog and which will not. You should work blog writing and reading time into your regular schedule, and if you know you will be unavailable for a period of time, invite a guest blogger(s) to fill your virtual shoes. remember, in the blogosphere, 10 days without posts could mean the death of your blog, as readers will be drawn elsewhere in virtual space.

Tip 4: Be regular. While related to the first two tips, the need to regularly post to your blog merits particular attention. In short, if you do not regularly post updated material to your blog—interesting material— whatever readership you have will quickly fade away.

Tip 5: Be generous. If your blog is nothing but an exercise in self-centeredness and self-congratulation (or links to organizations congratulating you), then your readership will tire of it. Use your blog as a platform for your jurisdiction, your staff, your family (to an extent), and so on. Take the opportunity to highlight special people in your district or community, and let your blog be a channel for spotlighting your area, not just yourself. Provide praise, applaud unsung heroes, and point out people in need of special help. In short, do good works with your words.

Tip 6: Have a “hard hide.” You cannot have a thin kin and engage in blogging. You will receive comments that range from the thoughtful and insightful o the unwarranted and the unprintable. You will also surely be praised by some tech-savvy constituents or using a new communications medium, while others will call your office or write a “snail mail” letter to ask what’s wrong with the more established forms of communication.

Tip 7: Spell-check. this almost goes without saying, but it is surprising how many blog posts have spelling and/or grammatical errors. When spotted, such mistakes can generate satirical comments, spawn bad publicity in traditional and non-traditional media, and detract from your message. As the saying goes, “that’s why God made a spell-checker!”

Tip 8: Don’t give too much information. While it is great to be honest and open in your blog, you can do it to the extreme. Let the blog be a window into your thoughts, your work, and your travels, but remember the blunt admonition of the anonymous (2003) author of The Blogger Manifesto, “nobody gives a [expletive] about what you had for breakfast” (n.p.).

Tip 9: Consider multimedia. While you must concentrate on providing timely updates to your blog, making them interesting and well written, having good content is not enough. It is crucial that you have an easy-to-navigate, visually appealing layout to your blog. In today’s environment, there is a ratcheting up of blog standards, and in a short time
it will be almost expected that video and audio elements be included on blogs. While you must learn to walk before your run, you should seek out links to audio/video sources to go multimedia at no cost, then you can begin to consider recording and producing our own audio/video content to offer as posts or podcasts on your blog.

Tip 10: Be a student of blogging. You should make it a regular habit to spend time each day being exposed to blogs other than your own. Find favorite blogs (political and non-political) and subscribe to them using a news reader or aggregator program (using RSS or Atom feeds). With these tools, you can view updates from your favorites in one place, without having to surf to multiple sites. Finally, check out the top-ranked blogs (according to Technorati or ComScore), and use this as an opportunity to benchmark the best of the best.

Feel free to comment and add your own tips!

In my next blog entry I will be rounding up examples of effective Public Sector Marketing Blogs in action. Send links my way if you know any good ones.

Canada and U.S seriously lagging in average broadband speed

This study was just released this week. Canada and the U.S are way behind the top dogs in terms of average broadband speed. To many individuals, this might come as a surprise and should act as a wake up call.

Consider this excerpt:

“In the first three years of the Bush administration, the United States dropped from 4th to 13th place in global rankings of broadband Internet usage. Today, most U.S. homes can access only “basic” broadband, among the slowest, most expensive, and least reliable in the developed world, and the United States has fallen even further behind in mobile-phone-based Internet access. The lag is arguably the result of the current administration’s failure to make a priority of developing these networks. In fact, the United States is the only industrialized state without an explicit national policy for promoting broadband. ” -ForeignAffairs.org

Here in Canada, (as you can see in the chart above), we’re not much better off at all. The West cannot afford to fall behind like this for much longer. Faster broadband leads not only to benefits for us marketers (i.e. a wider variety of information sharing possibilities and multi sensory media usage to get our messages across), but more importantly, towards a more educated and informed society as a whole.

So what’s stopping us? –>Lack of Fibre Optic cable infrastructure.

How did Japan do it in just 5 years? (note that in 2001, Japan was well behind the U.S and Canada). –>The government got the private sector involved, it gave subsidies and grants to telecom start-ups and most importantly, it saw the benefit and potential of ultra high-speed broadband.

So what do you think? Does the Canadian government dedicate enough resources towards broadband? Should our tax money be used? What would our society be like if everyone had fiber-optic ultra high-speed connections? When will we get there? I’m curious to hear your thoughts…

For more information on the e-Japan strategy and the incredible results, be sure to read this article.

Interactive Online Annual Reports vs. Scanned PDF Online Annual Reports

Why is it that every government department seems to think that people actually “read” things online. Read this carefully: THEY DON’T!

People “scan” text…reading online is unpleasant and unnatural given screen limitations, eye fatigue and an expectation for rapid information access. Study after study has proven this over and over again.

A good example where many public sector organizations fail at this miserably is in publishing online annual reports. For some reason, they are always displayed as scanned copies (PDF format) of the print version. This used to be all great in the past if your website was meant to simply act as a storage of information/warehouse for people to come and print documents. However, for those of you that haven’t noticed, the web has changed, such a website purpose is no longer acceptable.

Your website must now be engaging and interactive, this is what web users are used to, this is what they demand! It should help users find what they are looking for quickly and efficiently. There is nothing quick and efficient about a PDF (note: PDF’s should always be offered as an option but not as the ONLY option).

Take a look at what the Civil Service Commission has done in the UK with its annual report. This is a great example of effective integration of a PDF document with an interactive Annual Report (click on the link once you get on this page):Civil Service Commissioners | News | Annual report for 2006-07

Government of Canada finally adopts RSS feeds by Audience!

I remember going to the www.canada.gc.ca website a few months ago and browsing through the RSS feed links only to find that 90% of them were not active. To my surprise, I decided to give them another try today, and low and behold, they were working! What’s more the Canadian public can now obtain Government of Canada (GOC) RSS news updates by audience, department or province!

All this is great, only there is one problem. Why is nobody promoting this feature? Why is the RSS page link buried in the lower right hand corner of the landing page in small print? In my opinion there should be a direct call to action in a prevalent location. Most people don’t know what RSS means, therefore if that term is to be used, there should at least be a “what is RSS?” link right beside it. Even just two visually pleasing buttons, “Subscribe to our news feeds!” and “What is a news feed?” by its side would do the trick.

All in all though, kudos to the Canada.gc.ca web strategy team for logically organizing the feeds as a first step.