This article was taken from the February 2013 issue of Wired magazine. Be the first to read Wired's articles in print before they're posted online, and get your hands on loads of additional content by <span class="s1">subscribing online.
*Government digital service London
Employees: 185
Launch date: Oct 2012
Est. annual Gov.uk visits: 500 million*
This government department has embraced a flexible approach more akin to the startup community to develop and deliver user-friendly digital products.
Government Digital Service (GDS) in Holborn, London, may be responsible for rethinking all things digital as part of a Cabinet Office initiative, but its own offices bear little resemblance to a typical Whitehall department. The breakout area, casual dress code, coloured index cards pinned to walls to measure progress, and groups of developers and product specialists collaborating using Google Docs make it appear more like a startup than an office for civil servants. But the team here is delivering "a critical piece of national infrastructure", says Tom Loosemore, who led the delivery of the GOV.UK platform. The destination site if you're looking to purchase a new tax-disc for your car or calculate your VAT return, GOV.UK -- which went live last October -- replaces two websites, Directgov (for information on public services) and Business Link (a resource for businesses). The redesign is a response to a report published in 2010 by government "digital inclusion champion" Martha Lane Fox, which set out a framework for the digital delivery of services.
Working practices are guided by "agile" methodology -- based on the Manifesto for Agile Software Development, a document conceived by 17 senior software developers in 2001. It champions rapid delivery by teams that are focused on the end user.
Groups adapt to the changing requirements of the project and respond to user feedback to develop iteratively and incrementally. "We own the agile process, we don't let it own us," says Loosemore, who used to run Channel 4's digital investment fund 4iP. "We follow the principles of the agile manifesto in terms of getting code running as quick as we can and testing it. The two principles are: have something by Friday, and do something next week better than you did it this week. It's all about retrospectives and learning. It's not a big thing in the world I come from, but it's new for government." "The principle was about moving away from thinking about what the government wants to publish and towards focusing on user need," says Sarah Prag the product manager for GOV.UK. "We ended up with about 2,500 needs. The idea then is to think 'how can we best meet that need?'" The project required agility to be implemented on an unusually large scale. "GOV.UK involved 14 teams. That's 140 people -- that's big," Loosemore says.
The team embraced experimentation and being open to workspace hacks. Multidisciplinary teams emerged according to the tasks facing them rather than being imposed from the outset, and each team tracked its performance using verifiable data about its progress and delivery dates. "It was only possible because we didn't have a command-and-control structure," says Etienne Pollard, GOV.UK's deputy director. "There was constant communication at a working level."
For more ways to work smarter, check out the following stories
Commune with nature: Selgas Cano
Embrace a four-day week: Treehouse
Build your own social network: Lockheed Martin
Network by shared experiences: Honey Club
Structure open knowledge-swaps: IBM
Create a managerial algorithm: Google
Build a P2P bonus system: Zappos
Keep staff physically active: Technogym
Use Jedi mind tricks to get results: Robert Stephens
Revitalise through nutrition: The Chemistry Group
Discard short-term thinking: Unilever
Buy shares in your clinets: Kirshenbaum Bond Senecal and 's Baggers
Network your restaurant: Nordstrom
Get rid of your bosses: Valve
Design on demand: Nordstrom
This article was originally published by WIRED UK
