The End Of The Beginning

Last Friday I attended a meeting of the LocalGov Digital Steering Group. The group of local government digital practitioners of which I'm currently Vice Chair along with Carl Whistlecraft.

Comms Lead Sarah Lay has already written a great blog piece about it, so in the LocalGov Digital spirit of sharing and collaboration, rather then repeat what she's written read about what happened here and then come back to get my take on it, please.

For me, the meeting felt like the end of the beginning; the completion of the discovery phase and a move into outputting tangible products to assist everyone in local government who deliver services and information digitally.

Up until now, I know that some have seen LocalGov Digital purely as a think tank, but the Steering Group and wider network are digital doers and in the near future you'll start to see things like the Content Guidelines published.

The Guidelines collate and add to best practice from around the world to help councils improve the content on their websites. I'm all for criticism where standards the public expect aren't met, but if you're not going to offer practical help to make things better then perhaps doing so isn't as constructive as it could be.

This is just one tiny piece in the jigsaw of the Digital Framework for Local Public Services and expect much more as the initial work streams start to produce outputs, providing resources for digital practitioners in local government.

Please do join the network, either on the Knowledge Hub, Google+ or both. Sharing your experience and ideas will help the whole of local government and the people it serves.

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