Civic Talk: Recent Episodes
Anne Matthews and Dorin Greenwood
Anne and Dorin are highlighting great public services from around the world. We want to draw back the curtain on innovative services, policies and programs that citizens and government insiders would be inspired by.
Zayna Khayat, Health Futurist and Systems Thinker shares her vision for what patients should fight for in the future. In this wide ranging episode, she spotlights the best healthcare systems in the world and how we all need to be sherpas in these unsettling times. She doesn't hold back on what needs to happen for us to have the healthcare we deserve.
Zayna Khayat, Health Futurist and Systems Thinker shares her vision for what patients should fight for in the future. In this wide ranging episode, she spotlights the best health care systems in the world and how we all need to be sherpas in these unsettling times. She doesn't hold back on what needs to happen for us to experience the healthcare we deserve.
Zayna is VP of Business Development & Strategy with Teladoc Health in Canada. She's led teams re-thinking how health care is delivered at MaRs Discovery District, and spent time in the trenches as Future Strategist at SE Health, one of Canada's largest home health and aging non-profits. She's also on faculty at the Rotman School of Management and Singularity University.
Anil Wasif came to Canada from Bangladesh as a university student and now works in the Ontario Public Service. Like many young professional millennials, Anil has big ideas and big hopes for the future of government services and the impact millennials like him can have on government now--not twenty years from now.
But attracting and keeping young talent, he thinks, requires a new approach.
Resources from Anil:
A primer on Substack
Substacks:
Heated by Emily Atkin: https://heated.world/ (Climate Change)
Regs to Riches by Vass Bednar: https://www.regs2riches.com/ (Competition/Regulation Policy)
City Hall Watcher by Matt Elliot: https://graphicmatt.substack.com/ (Toronto City Hall Politics)Stories with data:
Vox Videos: https://www.youtube.com/c/Vox
Johnny Harris: https://www.youtube.com/c/JohnnyHarrisvox
Favourite Books:
Breakout Nations by Ruchir Sharma
A Promised Land by Barack Obama
In this episode Katherine Benjamin, Deputy Chief Technology Officer for the City of New York, explains what user research is, how it works and how user researchers like her are bringing a new approach to government services.
Here are a list of great resources Katherine shared with us if you're interested in learning more about user research and where it's happening in government:
User Research
Ontario Digital Service User Research Guide: https://www.ontario.ca/page/user-research-guide
Andrew Travers, Interviewing for research: https://trvrs.co/book
Stephanie Walter, Research Cheatsheet https://stephaniewalter.design/blog/a-cheatsheet-for-user-interview-and-follow-ups-questions/
Design - Service/experience
Dan Hill / Dark Matter and Trojan Horses: A Strategic Design Vocabulary: https://www.cityofsound.com/blog/2012/08/dark-matter.html https://www.amazon.com/Dark-Matter-Trojan-Horses-Vocabulary/dp/0992914639
User Journey Mapping vs. Service Blueprinting: https://blog.practicalservicedesign.com/the-difference-between-a-journey-map-and-a-service-blueprint-31a6e24c4a6c
Internet-era Ways of Working: https://public.digital/2018/10/12/internet-era-ways-of-working
Detecting Agile “BS,” by the Defence Innovation Board: https://media.defense.gov/2018/Oct/09/2002049591/-1/-1/0/DIB_DETECTING_AGILE_BS_2018.10.05.PDF
De-risking Guide by 18F: https://derisking-guide.18f.gov/
Wow! It really is the Wild West in California politics! While there's a federal election happening north of the 49th parallel, there's another very different kind of election happening in the most populous state in America. The Governor is being recalled and that means he could get the boot from Office on September 14th.
We talked to Ben Christopher who covers politics and government for CalMatters.org about what a recall is, why it's happening now, how it works and what it could mean for Governor Gavin Newsom.
Ben Christopher covers California politics and elections for CalMatters.org, a nonpartisan, nonprofit journalism venture committed to explaining how California’s state Capitol works and why it matters.
Covid vaccine passports are coming to Ontario, other Canadian provinces, and jurisdictions around the world. Dorin and Anne discuss some of the issues that surround vaccine passports in other places around the globe.
Anne gets the scoop from Nova Scotia's Chief Digital Officer, Natasha Clarke, on what it was like to navigate a new team through the pandemic right after she was appointed to the position.
Will they go back to the classroom? Will they stay at home? When? How? What will class look like? In part one of our third episode we discuss our personal experiences with policy whiplash during the pandemic as it related to our kids' education.
We confess to finding the loopholes in the COVID 19 public health policies--something that is just a part of being human that public policy doesn't always consider.
Four clever public sector experts vent on the public service... the good, the bad and the ugly.
Meet Anne and Dorin in their experimental podcast about what's really happening in government.