Andrea DiMaio

Over the last three months I have had, like most Gartner analysts,  several client conversations about cost cutting, or – as many, including us, more diplomatically call it – “cost optimization”. This is not new to government: several jurisdictions have been on a multi-annual journey toward greater efficiency, with progressive reduction of operational spending, usually to [...]

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This afternoon I gave a short presentation about open source in the public sector to a group of CIOs from European cities. I told them how I’ve gradually seen the emotional and “religious” arguments behind open source being replaced by more rational cost and vendor independence considerations, and I pointed to the recent UK open [...]

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After a few months of negotiation, the US General Services Administration has signed agreements with four mainstream social media service providers, namely Flickr, YouTube, Vimeo and blip.tv.
As Federal Computer Week reports, the agreements “resolve legal concerns associated with many standard terms and conditions that pose problems for agencies, such as liability limits, endorsements and freedom of information”. [...]

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President Obama is walking the talk by giving people the ability to ask and rate questions on whitehouse.gov. The process is very simple, as it takes just a name, surname and postcode to register. Questions can be submitted in a number of different areas, ranging from Jobs to environment, from financial stability to budget. This [...]

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I just saw the report Value for citizens – A vision of public governance in 2020, which has been produced under the auspices of the European Commission to support discussion and work for the so-called “post-i2010 debate”.
i2010 has been the European Union policy framework for activities on the Information Society and digital economy, including e-government. [...]

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I know I know, this question is counter-intuitive while the US and other countries (such UK and Singapore) deploy or plan to deploy more broadband access as a means to close the digital divide, boost competitiveness, re-ignite the economy, and so forth. It does make sense, at times of recession (or worse) to spend in [...]

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Those who read my recent posts about the new US federal CIOs Vivek Kundra have certainly noticed how enthusiastically I welcomed his appointment and how strongly I felt about this being a turning point for a new role of IT in government. As I talked to clients in several countries over the last two weeks, I [...]

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While on the plane yesterday, I read more carefully part of the UK Public Sector Reform Agenda, which I covered in a previous post. The section that caught my attention was the one on Active Welfare and High Skills, concerning how the UK benefits and skills system is organizing to face the global economic crisis. [...]

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A Presidential memo dated March 4th calls for a review of existing contracts, which may lead to corrective actions including termination of those that do not meet agency needs, as well as for the establishment of government-wide guidance to “govern the appropriate use and oversight of all contract types”.
Amongst other things, the memo says that
“…the [...]

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I just got hold of the UK public service reform agenda, which was published earlier today. I just had time to browse through it and will need more time to digest and advise our clients in a research note.
The title “Working together – Public services on your side” is quite interesting, as it captures the [...]

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