{"id":49,"date":"2004-10-12T11:47:49","date_gmt":"2004-10-12T15:47:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/cesarbreadev\/the-state-of-e-government\/"},"modified":"2004-10-12T11:47:49","modified_gmt":"2004-10-12T15:47:49","slug":"the-state-of-e-government","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/cesarbreadev\/the-state-of-e-government\/","title":{"rendered":"The State of e-Government"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

This week I attended the National
\nElectronic Commerce Coordinating Council<\/a> meetings in Boise, Idaho. 
\n<\/span>The theme of the conference was “Government in the Digital Age: Myths,
\nRealities & Promises – A Candid Assessment and Road Map for Success.”<\/p>\n

(I went on behalf of the E-Government Executive
\nEducation (3E) Project<\/a> at Harvard’s JFK School of Government (KSG), where I
\nam working with Professor
\nJerry Mechling<\/a> to develop a new online application called the Compass.  <\/span>The Compass, built on .LRN<\/a> with the support of IBM, includes
\nassessment, benchmarking, and library tools which will support both the 3E
\nProject’s executive education programs, and perhaps later other KSG and other
\nprograms.  <\/span>We showed an early version of
\nthe Compass to 25 execs gracious enough to give us their time, and their
\nresponse and feedback were both encouraging and useful.<\/p>\n

The first “production” use of the Compass prototype will be
\nfor a 3E program we’ll be running in December called “Leadership in a Networked
\nWorld: The 2005 Leadership Agenda”.  <\/span>The
\npurpose of the program is to help senior public sector executives and their
\nadvisors evaluate and set priorities among IT-enabled initiatives, not only in
\nlight of their potential value, but of the political calculus associated with
\nthem as well.  <\/span>After choosing a few to
\nfocus on, the program then considers how best to pursue these priorities given
\ntheir associated political considerations.)<\/p>\n

Conferences can be a mixed bag.  <\/span>This was a good one.  <\/span>The participants included current and former
\nstate comptrollers, auditors, and CIOs. 
\n<\/span>Vendors were represented by very experienced folks who had themselves
\nbeen in the roles of the government participants and were well-known and
\nrespected.  <\/span>So in addition to a very
\ncollegial feeling there was little of the awkwardness and stiff hype that’s
\ntypical of other vendor-customer interactions.<\/p>\n

I’d never been to Idaho
\nbefore.  <\/span>Boise
\nis a nice town, with some attractive architecture (state capitol, churches) and
\nsome incredible views.  <\/span>There’s a really
\ngood, inexpensive Basque restaurant called Bar Gernika across the street from
\nthe Grove Hotel where Jerry and I had lunch (lamb-dip sandwich: good) and Dan
\nCombs and I had dinner (lamb stew: great). 
\n<\/span>Apparently you can fish in the river that runs through town, though I
\ndidn’t get to try that.  <\/span>And of course it
\ntook me a bit to adjust to saying “how-do” to passersby, and to wait to cross
\nuntil the light said I could.<\/p>\n

Here’s some of what I heard and learned (not necessarily a
\nfaithful transcription of what people said, presented, or intended).<\/p>\n

Wednesday morning’s plenary session was keynoted by Peter
\nHarkness, the editor and publisher of Governing<\/i><\/a>
\nmagazine. His theme: the e-government revolution hasn’t really happened
\nyet.  <\/span>My notes:<\/p>\n