Last month, we posted a poll on Canadian Government Executive that asked the question, “Do you think your input into Blueprint 2020 will make a difference?”
Well, the results are in, and more than half of you – 51.5 percent – voted “No.” A little more than 30 percent of you voted “Yes”, and 18.4 percent of you voted “Possibly.” Most of the discussion about Blueprint 2020 has been evenly divided between the two camps, both on our website and in the general Twittersphere – so it’s interesting to see such an overwhelming negative response on the poll.
The Clerk has staked a lot on the fact that he is using social media to get bottom-up input from public servants into the process, with the hope, I am sure, that it will add credibility to the project as well as substance.
The risk is that the expectations he has raised aren’t met, and that the participants do not see enough of their input in the direction-setting report that will come out in early 2014.
Put differently, it’s a safe bet that the formal reports from departments, and the Clerk’s own views on the future, will be key to setting the future directional stage. How much difference the bottom-up contributions will make will be interesting to see.
And don’t forget to stay tuned for our January edition – we’ll be discussing public sector transformation and Blueprint 2020.
Toby Fyfe is Editor-in-Chief of Canadian Government Executive magazine. He is also Vice-President of the Learning Lab at the Institute on Governance in Ottawa. He writes regularly on public management issues, both in a weekly e-newsletter for Canadian Government Executive and on Twitter at @tfyfe.
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