Jerry Fishenden’s technology blog
-
UK cross-government platforms, 2003 edition
While reviewing and updating my Digital Government Archives, I came across some old slide decks from the days of the eDelivery Team (the Government Digital Service of its day). Several of the slides jumped out at me for the way they placed users at the centre of their design, and in particular the way they…
-
Integrating technology and policymaking
I’ve written before about the need to better integrate technology and policymaking — in 360-degree policy making, policy making in the digital age, and many earlier pieces going back over several decades, such as my 2006 co-authored paper The New World of Government Work. Governments have been keen to take advantage of digital, data and…
-
360-degree policy making
How can we improve policy making to make it more effective — not just for politicians and policy makers, but citizens, organisations and communities too? One of the defining characteristics of the “digital revolution” is continuous feedback and improvement. The best organisations learn what works and what doesn’t in a timely, efficient way. They update…
-
International Standards and Digital Identity
So-called ‘digital transformation’ can often involve little more than moving things from paper onto a screen or automating the way things are already done, aiming to optimise them or reduce costs. Nothing wrong with that in itself of course, but it’s not really ‘transformational’ in any real meaning of the word, more about efficiency and…
-
Policymaking in the digital age
UK Authority have published my article Rethinking policy making in the digital age. It explores the need for a national digital infrastructure that provides open, real time interfaces to public sector systems, processes and data to help open up, democratise and improve the policy making process. Creating this would benefit all those who want to…
-
Rebooting ‘progressive’ politics
In his speech at the end of July, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury talked about the need for a “faster, smarter” culture in government and “to make data a key part of policymaking”. If it sounded familiar, that’s because it was. Similar sentiments have been repeatedly expressed by numerous governments over several decades. My…
-
Maggots, rats and a fork in the road
So what’s it going to be then, hey? Will the outcome of the Brexit negotiations see the UK forced to adhere to the EU’s “level playing field” rules, or free to set its own standards? The mood music is ominous, hinting that the UK could adopt lower standards in some Mad Max “race to the…
-
Online public services in the UK—23 years of federated identity
Here’s my paper providing an overview of Federated Identity for Access to UK Public Services: 1997-2020 (PDF): As its catchy title suggests, it provides an historic overview of the UK Government’s approach to federated identity over the past 23 years, segmenting the journey into three stages: It isn’t intended to be history for its own sake—it aims…
-
‘Blueshift’ and the evergreen promise of the ‘future’ of work
15 years ago at Microsoft, I proposed a programme called ‘Blueshift’. It was a deliberate provocation, an attempt to move away from rusty soundbites about ‘new ways of working’ and ‘digital transformation’ and similar digital-blah-blah towards the delivery of practical improvements in the way organisations operate. Microsoft was a well-established global brand, yet I felt…
-
Future Shock | After Shock
It’s 50 years since Alvin Toffler‘s ‘Future Shock‘ was published in 1970. I remember first reading it some time later, in a battered, orange-coloured paperback edition I acquired at a bargain price from one of the secondhand bookshops in the Charing Cross Road. The book made a strong impression on me. Partly, I guess, because…
-
21st century identity
My opinion piece for Computer Weekly – implementing a 21st century approach to digital identity – has been published this morning. It sets out a new, modern approach – one that embraces identity as a means of personal empowerment rather than state or corporate control. It looks at how the current trust model around identity…
-
Tortoise banks and uneven playing fields
Perhaps we had a lucky escape when banks declined to become online ‘identity providers’. After all, their track record in online security has some peculiar idiosyncrasies. Arguably they’ve made the problem of fraud greater than it should be by failing to create a consistent, secure customer experience. Obvious examples include the fraud caused by not…
new tech observations from the UK (ntouk) 