No.10 Fellow notes - government, strategy and delivery
Half way through my year in government - feels like a good moment to share some reflections.
Let’s pick three themes.
The ‘once vs many’ of government digital
I guess this is the big question in government, isn’t it? What should be done centrally, once, and well? What is better done locally, and flexibly? How do you balance the costs of regulation with the risks and costs of inconsistency and duplication?
There are lots of examples of this debate in education. (What a fascinating privilege to be at the DfE at this moment.)
And we have been raised to come at this question from a dogmatic, big “P” political, standpoint. Big vs small government. Left vs Right.
But working within government, you see it as an organisational, structural, and practical challenge.
One example is the centralisation of digital services, infrastructure and components. Things like identity management, analytics, content management, and data infrastructure.
What should the centre of government (meaning GDS and the new CDDO) build once, and well? What should be left to Departments? Within Departments, what should be done centrally, at portfolio level, or within individual services? And what shouldn’t be done at all?
In government tech, ‘once vs many’ is maybe more important than ‘buy vs build’.
These may sound like abstract questions but I increasingly think they are the most important strategic questions for government digital.
My general feeling is that more of government digital should be done centrally. Technology isn’t as domain-specific as we often like to think. Software is expensive to build and maintain, so the cost of duplication is very high.
Does it really make sense to have so many government Departments and teams building so many similar things?
But it is extremely difficult to deliver centralised technology across such a vast estate. So the truth is I’m not sure. The implications are huge, and the path is unclear… and that’s why it is such an important question.
Innovation for the long term
I’ve been thinking about this one a lot, and am hoping to do some proper talks/blogs about it.
Innovation is often characterised as a short-term thing. Be agile, work in sprints, disrupt!
There’s an idea that this is how the commercial world works - where everything seems to be faster.
But the processes of agile are not a replacement for having a coherent, focused strategy.
If you look at successes in the commercial world, you don’t just see a freewheeling spirit of “move fast and break things.”
Make a list … Amazon, Apple, Stripe, Spotify… and you will find companies that have spent years, decades, with their heads down, tightly focused on a few opportunities. Deeply strategic.
One of my favourite examples is Tesla. In August 2006, Elon Musk published ‘The Secret Tesla Motors Master Plan’. Here’s the ending:
So, in short, the master plan is:
Build sports car
Use that money to build an affordable car
Use that money to build an even more affordable car
While doing above, also provide zero emission electric power generation options
Don't tell anyone.
Ried Hoffman has a nice quote: “Innovation comes from long-term thinking and iterative execution.”
I believe government needs to follow this lead. Don’t think of innovation as ‘small teams doing Agile’. Think of agile innovation as the best way an organisation can deliver on a long-term vision.
And there are examples of this long-term approach in government. Maybe the most interesting one right now is the recent Levelling Up White Paper, which sets targets for 12 missions, to be achieved by 2030.
For education, one of the targets is for 90% of primary children to achieve the expected standard in reading, writing, and maths.
The response to this has been mixed, and interesting in itself. The most common push back is, “where’s the detail?”
That’s a fair challenge, but you could say exactly the same about the Tesla master plan.
People and logistics
I feel like half of my posts end with a section about the importance of people.
But this has really struck me afresh. When you are working on strategy and planning, as a leader, it is fine to write ambitious words and make nice slide decks. (And I’m talking about myself here!)
All those ideas are only valuable if the people in the organisation understand and embrace them, and are set up to deliver on them.
This is hard in any organisation, and feels especially difficult in government given the size of Departments and the nature of politics (“Events dear boy, events”).
In the early stages of The Key, when our future was very much in the balance, our CEO Fergal Roche often spoke about ‘flexibility and resilience’. We knew what we wanted to do, we were convinced it was worthwhile, but we understood that it would be a bumpy road.
In boxing they say “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth”. And there’s a military saying, “Amateurs talk strategy. Professionals talk logistics.”
There’s something similar we all face: everyone has a strategy until they present it to their team.
Communicating and ‘selling’ the strategy, and asking people to embrace it. Empowering them to own and deliver it. Creating the logistics so it can actually happen… that’s the real work.