I keep an eye on USAJobs just to see what positions the Federal government is trying to fill. Lately, there have been a lot of postings for Chief, New Media, New Media Specialist, and similar positions.  Most of these positions are in agency communications or public relations groups and are responsible for aspects of the agency Web site, implementing blogs, and assisting agencies in understanding this new Web 2.0 world.

Filling positions like these is important, as there are lots of government employees writing blogs, twittering, and using other forms of social media. But government is missing a unique opportunity to really engage with citizens. If you look at most of the blogs, follow the tweets, check the Web pages, government is going about its adoption of Web 2.0 pretty much the same way government has always gone about this – we talk and you listen. Is that really engagement?

Government is in a unique position where social media is presenting an opportunity to actually engage with citizens again. But social media is not a synonym for engagement. Citizen engagement is:

• More than tweeting. Twitter, though a wonderful tool, is still a very shallow form of engagement and the number of user is still limited (though Ashton Kutcher, Oprah, and Larry King may have changed that). There was a recent non-scientific poll on CNN.com asking users to indicate what they thought about Twitter. The results, of the over 17,000 who responded, was that 63% don’t use twitter and 30% wondered what twitter was. Only 7% of the average citizen has used Twitter.
• More than blogging. Blogging is a great way to communicate information, but it is not the best engagement tool. Though there is potential through the use of comments, when it comes to government blogs citizen comments generally outnumber government responses by more that than ten to one.  Even the best government blogs, for example such as TSA’s Evolution of Security, have a hard time keeping up.  A quick survey of TSA’s EoS five blog posts and associated comments between April 9th and April 21st, 2009 found that only 42 of the 377 comments were responses by the agency.
• More than an electronic town hall meeting. Though a good start the recent electronic town hall meeting held by President Obama has to be declared a success from a PR perspective and a failure from a citizen engagement perspective. Why? Because the President was only able to respond to a handful of the over 104,.000 questions that came to him.

Though bringing Web 2.0 experts into government is important, what agencies really need are Citizen Engagement Specialists (CES). My friend and former colleague at Forrester, Bruce Temkin (check out his excellent blog Customer Experience Matters), coined the term Chief Customer Experience Officer (CCEO) to describe someone whose role is responsible for making sure the customer has a great experience and is an who advocates for the customer.  Bruce’s research has shown that for the most part a majority of companies provide a poor customer experience and for those that do provide a good experience, the experience is a significant differentiator.

So far Bruce has not looked at the customer experience of government, but I would bet that government would be near the bottom. Why? Because there is no one in government who really advocates for the experience of the citizen interacting with the agency. Yes, there are ombudsmen, but they are there only to help when something goes wrong, not to improve the everyday interaction between citizen and government. That is where the role of a CES comes in, focusing on representing the views and needs of the citizen as a customer of government, and then helping the agency actually engage with the citizen.

What if government were to adopt this idea, what should a Citizen Engagement Specialist focus on? They would focus on

1. Help the organization research and see the citizen from all sides. One of their first roles should be to help the agency really understand who their primary constituents are. Yes, government agencies have to serve everyone who walks through their door, but that doesn’t mean that they are their primary or even secondary users. This would include helping the agency understand content and functionality desires, channel preferences, previous experiences, how they view the agency, etc. This would also require that the CES develop a deeper level of knowledge and continue to connect with constituents to maintain that understanding.
2. Experience what the citizen experiences. During a briefing a few years back, I learned about a program at an international telecommunications company that required executives at all levels to spend time in the contact center every month answering customer questions.  I think government executives from the Secretary on down need to adopt this approach. Spend time in contact centers answering citizen calls, applying for aid online, posting questions on an agency blog, etc. Take the time to see how their employees and agency treat constituents.
3. Representing the perspective of the citizen. Similar to the role a persona plays in a design discussion, the CES would represent the citizen within the agency on questions and issues around engagement. For example, if the agency is designing a new Web site, implementing a blog, developing an employee Twitter policy, constructing a series of online educational videos, developing new scripts for a contact center, or even determining what new functionality or content to add, the CES would represent the role of the citizen.
4. Build relationships through engagement. This includes a myriad of responsibilities from developing plans and strategies to improve engagement to developing appropriate performance measures to working to remove internal barriers to engagement. For example, the outward facing aspect of this position would be to interact with citizens, their representative interest groups (such as the AARP in the case of the Social Security Administration), and vendors to develop plans and strategies that would improve engagement.  Internally, this may mean working with the agency General Counsel to develop a balanced blogging policy.

The Bottom Line: Transparency, accountability, and participation are good.  Engagement is better. Move beyond the technology roles of CIO’s and CTO’s to a role that focuses on citizen engagement.

In speaking with a number of government Web managers and corresponding vendors recently, I have been asked a lot about why government Web sites and new media efforts are so “poor.” My first response generally is what do you mean by poor and I have been told things like “You can’t find anything on the site” or “The tweets are a mismatch of junk” or “The blog is filled with government speak that few understand” among many others. I then explain that it is most likely because they didn’t build a solid foundation before they started.

When it comes to a successful digital government effort, most Web Managers and New Media Chief’s don’t really think about what kind of foundation they are putting in place. Most are content to jump right in, putting up a Web site, starting a blog, allowing employees to tweet, etc. I am an advocate of open and transparent government, but jumping in like this with out some forethought and cornerstones for continued design and evolution is like building the proverbial house on sand – it won’t stand for long.

Note that I am using the term channel because whether it is a Web site, a twitter stream, a blog, or a Facebook page these three aspects of a foundation are applicable across all.

What constitutes a solid foundation for a digital effort? Three things – content, function, and brand.

• Content. Content is what your constituents want to know and what you want them to know by interacting with you on this channel. Who ever first said content is king was right. Citizens come to your Web sites, read your blog entries, watch your You Tube videos, and follow you on twitter because they are expecting to get content from you.
• Function. Function is what your constituents want to accomplish in this channel and what you want them to accomplish in this channel. Right now most of this is limited to the Web, but expect this to change in the near future as function follows content into other channels. Whether it is the ability to purchase postage, check your social security earnings, check on the status of your tax refund, or make a reservation at a campground online, constituents want and should be able to do more online.
• Brand. Brand is the impression you leave them with and yes the government has a brand. Just check the public perception scores of the National Park Service (NPS) against the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). We have all heard the similar stories about the horrific experience Aunt Jane had with the bureaucratic red tape she had to wade through in order to collect her pension or Social Security. As much as I wish these were urban myths, unfortunately most are not. The type of experience you provide across channels will impact the image of your agency and the government as a whole.

Each of these things is one aspect of the interaction between you and your constituency. And like any relationship, there are two sides to each. There may be content or functionality that your constituents want but you are not able to provide yet. If it is something they really want (you should know this based upon the persona research you have done) and you can’t provide it then make the effort to explain why you can’t and if it will be provided in the future.

The Bottom Line: Check and see how solid the foundation of your digital relationship is. Repair where necessary.

Alice: Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?

The Cat: That depends a good deal on where you want to get to.

Alice: I don’t much care where.

The Cat: Then it doesn’t much matter which way you go.

Alice: …so long as I get somewhere.

The Cat: Oh, you’re sure to do that, if only you walk long enough.

Federal Computer Week reported last week that the US General Services Administration (GSA) has continued the Federal government push into Web 2.0 by signing agreements with four mainstream social media service providers – blip.tv, Flickr, Vimeo, and YouTube that resolves the unique legal issues for government. The use of Web 2.0 technologies isn’t a new thing for government, but this agreement will accelerate its use by agencies, which is great. The problem is that government may be falling down the proverbial rabbit hole.

What do I mean? If you work in a government agency and hear things like “we should start a blog” or “we should build a wiki” or “we should start tweeting” before you hear about the audience for the effort and the purpose, than you have fallen down the rabbit hole of technology.

Any effort should begin with determining your target audience and what your desired outcome is – your purpose.  I have already written a bit about your target audience, so I am going to focus on the purpose.

Sure, you have your high level objectives – interact with and listen to citizens. But if I had a dime for every time I heard that answer I would be a wealthy man. But that answer is not specific enough. You need to be much more precise by clearly defining what you are doing (breaking down channel, message type, and more) and what you expect your constituents to do with the content. You accomplish this by asking and answering the questions why are you doing this and what do you want to accomplish.

What are some good purposes for government starting a Web 2.0 effort? The four primary purposes in order of lowest to highest level of development are:

• Talking. This is the most common form of government communication (government speaks and citizens listen) and the most likely end result of most government Web 2.0 efforts. It doesn’t tap all of the potential of the technology or environment, but that doesn’t make it any less important or correct.
• Listening. This is the second most likely form of government Web 2.0 implementation. Efforts at listening will range across a continuum that stretches from one-way input (for example citizens using twitter, a wiki, or some similar technology to provide input on a policy) to an almost two-way dialogue (for example agencies posting on a blog and allowing citizens to comment, but never responding to the comments).
• Engaging. This is a true two-way conversation. This could include responding to comments by citizens to an agency blog posting to actually engaging in a digital conversation such as in a digital town hall meeting. The sad fact right now though is that implementation of this on a large scale is not likely in the near future.
• Supporting. This is the most uncomfortable to agency policy makers – providing a platform that allows citizens to engage each other digitally to discuss the issues and policies that they are interested in or concerned about.

There are other potential purposes, but these are the four broad categories that generally apply to government. It is possible to overlap these and use a single channel for more than one purpose, but I wouldn’t suggest or encourage it.

If you are thinking about starting or improving a current Web 2.0 effort, after you have determined who your target audience is, put some thought and discussion into the purpose before you focus on the technology.

The bottom line: Know your audience and purpose before you think about technology.

Personas are a composite fictional representation of your target audience presented as a narrative description. Good personas are based on primary user research for each major customer segment.  Each persona is based upon user research, including survey research and actually speaking with and observing real users. The concept of personas came from work originally done by Alan Cooper around user interface design and laid out in his book The Inmates Are Running The Asylum.

Personas can be as simple or as complicated as needed. A basic persona is based upon a segmentation analysis. A simple segmentation analysis for a Web site or a social media effort – for example an assistance program – might include customer segments for people actually receiving the assistance, people and agencies who assist those receiving assistance, and others who are interested in the program. For each segment, information that should be part of the basic persona would include demographic information, content preferences, and key goals. More robust personas, based upon deeper market and audience research resulting in a deeper market segmentation analysis, can be developed but there is an exponentially higher cost for the deeper information you go after.

Developing and using personas in government is a five step process. Note that this assumes a citizen targeted program and not a business targeted program.

1. Define your primary target audience. Start by defining who would be the primary beneficiary of the content and functionality you are providing. This is your first customer segmentation or persona. Define secondary target audiences by constructing an ecosystem of those people and groups who support, assist, or impact the primary target audience. These are your secondary personas  There should not be any more that three or four of these.
2. Gather basic information about each segment. This should include demographic information (age, gender, and other demographic information relative to the program), key attributes relevant to the program, and key goals relevant to the program. I know that there are limits to the amount of information that government can gather directly, but there are a lot of secondary sources that can be employed in this.
3. Construct a narrative. Based upon the information you have collected, construct a fictional narrative that is a composite of the overall group. This narrative should read like a day in the life of this fictional person and how they interact with the program. Key attributes and key goals relative to the program should be called out clearly and if necessary, separately.
4. Design content and functionality that is relevant. When it comes to selecting an appropriate social media channel, crafting your message or blog entry, or designing the content and functionality for your Web site, look at it through the lens of your personas to determine if they would find it useful and usable.
5. Continue to test and refine your personas. Expect that things will change. It may be the program, it may be the administration, it may be your target constituency. To keep relevant you should periodically review the underlying data for your personas for indications of a shift. When you identify a change, you should go back and update your personas.

The bottom line: Before you start any social media or Web efforts, or even before you write a blog entry, ask and answer the question “For whom?”

Ask almost any government blogger or twitterati who they are blogging or tweeting for and the answer will likely be some version of “our constituents.” Dig a bit deeper, ask a few more questions and you may get a more specific answer like “people who are interested in Program Y.” Dig any more and the conversation will circle back to the original answer – “our constituents.”

Blogging or tweeting to “our constituents” is akin to standing in the town square shouting your message to people as they pass by. Some will stop and listen but unless your message is so broadly important and compelling, such as the President’s, most will consider you a mild curiosity at best or just ignore you and your message completely. Not a good way to get your message across and a complete waste of time and resources.

Yes, I know government has to serve everyone who walks through the digital door. But that doesn’t mean government has to serve everyone in every possible channel. Just as Twitter wouldn’t be the best channel to reach out to people getting ready to apply for social security, a USPS delivered direct marketing piece isn’t the best channel to attract a recent grad to a job in electronic warfare in the Air Force. Notice I said best – there is a statistical chance (similar to a snowball’s in a very warm place) of reaching some of your audience in any channel. But it clearly isn’t the best use of your resources.

The bottom line: Target your social media efforts and messages to a specific defined audience.

• Some agencies are quickly and effectively taking advantage of Web 2.0. Lynn Dean from TSA talked about her efforts at TSA to implement the Evolution of Security blog focused on the citizen experience at airport checkpoints nation wide. What drove the beginning of a blog at TSA? Former TSA Director Kip Hawley essentially told his staff that he wanted an official TSA blog or that he would continue to comment on other people’s blogs. When the agency director wants something like a blog and issues a memo saying so, that makes for a heck of an easy business case! Yes, Lynn who was tasked with implementing the blog, faced the common issues around the unique legal aspects of government including how a government agency responds to comments, recordkeeping requirements, etc. But she was able to overcome them and put together a top rated blog. And if you have an issue with TSA, go ahead and post a comment. And they really do publish them!

• Crises are great opportunities to showcase the value of new media. Did you hear about the recent salmonella outbreak related to peanuts? Odds are that how you received that information was either directly or indirectly influenced by HHS’s use of Web 2.0 tools including twitter. Andrew Winston from HHS spoke about the lessons learned in turning to new media tools to quickly inform the public about a critical issue. Yes, they used traditional media also, but Web 2.0 tools were a critical part of their toolbox.

• GSA, along with the White House Office of New Media, is taking the lead. Under the new Obama Administration, there is a more definite push to use Web 2.0 tools to make government more transparent and more citizen-centric. Teresa Nasif from GSA presented on GSA’s efforts to encourage to adopt Web 2.0 technologies as a key tool in becoming more transparent and citizen centric. There are a number of great tools on the GSA Web site that are of value to government and non-government. Just go to the Government 2.0 page and check out what GSA is doing along with the tools and lessons learned that they are sharing.

What are some of the issues that government still faces?

• Not everyone believes or agrees with the value of Web 2.0. There are still many in government who don’t recognize the value of transparency through technology, who are concerned about the security issues, and who don’t want to make all this information so easily accessible. To be honest though, there are still a lot of people in corporate America who feel the same way. But if you at all watch the growth in social media use by Gen Y, Gen X, and even the increasing use by the Baby Boomers and the Silvers, you can’t help but see this as a growing tidal wave that you can either ride or get swept away by. My recommendations for civil servants facing this? Show them the great outcomes TSA got from their blog, or how the Stimulus law was so effectively made available by GPO, or how HHS handled the salmonella issue. Success is a great argument for doing more.

• Government still needs to better target who their users are. Yes, every agency is responsible for responding to everyone in the public. But each program also has a specific targeted constituency that are likely to be the ones visiting their sites, reading their blogs, and reading their tweets. For example, people who are individual taxpayers expecting a refund are the perfect target for IRS’s Where’s My Refund application. If you are a college student, or the parent of a college student, than it makes sense that Department of Education’s Student Loan FAFSA is perfectly targeted to you. What it comes down to is if you are in government, you still need to think about using personas and scenario design principles and then designing sites and Web 2.0 efforts accordingly.

Bottom line? The Federal Government is making great strides in harnessing the power of Web 2.0, and in some cases are further ahead than many large corporations I have worked with. That being said, there is a lot of opportunity to build the business case for a more “social” government and a lot of work being done in aligning the customers, desired outcomes, and technologies employed.

*My thanks to Rob Pinkerton and others at Adobe for inviting me to attend.

What will the Ronin Research Group blog cover? It will be a professional and objective look into the intersection of the government Web world, government and broader social culture, social media, citizen engagement, and the vendors and technologies that underpin it. My expectation is that the result will be a candid and honest conversation and assessment about what can or does work, what others have tried, and what is of value in the new world of Government 2.0. The discussion could, and should, range from the strategic to the tactical, but will focus on three macro trends:

• The changing nature of government-to-citizen digital engagement
• Shifts in technology and how they can help government engage with citizens and business
• What strategies to employ to pull it all together

The focus of all of this will be the end user – the citizen or the business that government is interacting with..

I was a former analyst at Forrester and I am sure that I will pull from experiences there that covered the digital properties, social media, eGovernment, and the broader Web world, but I am also expecting that this will be a two way street – that I can learn and interact here in ways that will benefit my work and clients. I am also smart enough to know that I there is a lot to know about digitally enabled government and technologies, that I only know some of it, and that this interaction and conversation is an opportunity for me to learn.

I encourage you to join the coversation.

Alan