Disaster 3.0 Research: Outlining the Future

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In about one week I officially start my PhD Program in Disaster Management.  I am excited, scared and overwhelmed all at the same time.  But overall I am excited to give back to the disaster community in this unique way. When going through a PhD program, one's goal is generally to improve the condition of the studied community through rigorous research and meaningful findings.  In essence, while others contribute by providing leadership, innovating, and managing programs, etc., the PhD contributes through research.  Of course, there is always overlap.  In fact, I am most excited about the overlap.

However, because disaster management is a rapidly evolving field that is highly complex and interdisciplinary, research possibilities are seemingly endless.  Where do I even begin?  The good news is that I have started to narrow down my focus area to how technology is impacting the way we manage disasters.  I want to explore organizational and social behaviors that are changing as a result of technology as well as how we adopt and implement new technologies into our existing environment.  Ultimately, I believe technology has the power to improve disaster management and resilience...we just need better research and case studies (in addition to other initiatives) to put it all in better context.

Unfortunately, I am only human and my so-called "narrowed" focus area is really not that narrow.  I cannot research all the sub-topics that fall into this heading.  So I want to put this out to the world, what are the most pressing research topics for you or your community or organization?  What is priority number one to get a handle on so we can better adapt to our changing environment?  I want to be as applied as possible in my research as I cross-cut the policy, management and technology domains within the field.

Here are some topics I have toyed around with that may pique your interest and spur additional thoughts...

  • Education of the next (or current) emergency manager: competencies and knowledge
  • Enabling disruptive innovation in disaster management:  From Concept to Maturity
  • The decentralized and social capital infused future: Implications for future disaster management
  • Developing complex adaptive systems in a complex and adaptive world: Getting ahead of the curve
  • Disaster management in the next decade:  Requirements for a healthy technology-based ecosystem
  • Data, information & decision Making:  Where are we and where do we need to be?
  • From monitoring to action:  Building the Roadmap for Success
  • Big Data & Open Data: Improving disaster management byte by byte

These are by no means an exhaustive list of my interests.  They expand well beyond these, especially as I am continually inspired by so many people and initiatives including Patrick Meier and Beth Noveck at the GovLab (#Gov30 - Governance 3.0).

So as I embark on this journey, I ask the following of you...

  1. What are the most pressing research topics for you or your community or organization?
  2. What is priority number one to get a handle on so we can better adapt to our changing environment? 

Reply in the comments.  Start at #Disaster30 discussion on Twitter/Facebook/LinkedIn, etc.  I am all ears.

Can a Social Network Replace EOC Software?

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For years, emergency operations software such as WebEOC have been our primary response communications and management systems.  As we progressively move into a more social and interconnected world, solutions that are cost effective, but cut across organizational boundaries are essential. I have been toying with the idea utilizing a white label social network (your own fully branded social network) such as Ning.com to form the emergency operations backbone of smaller communities and/or specialized functional groups throughout all phases of emergency management.  While Ning doesn't have all the features a community may want, I believe it to have many of the core functions needed for small communities to effectively communicate and manage operations.

In fact, CrisisMappers, the Standby Task Force and the Digital Humanitarian Network already use Ning to support their operations.

The are some great benefits to using a tool like Ning for core situational awareness and interagency communications:

  • Setup and maintenance costs are VERY minimal ( $50/month for 1,000 users)
  • The platform is easily scalable with no per seat licenses
  • Easy adoption & training as the platform mimics key features of familiar social networks such as Facebook and LinkedIn
  • Has "Group" functionality to develop specialized pages and conversation
  • Easy membership management with roles
  • Easy privacy controls
  • Mobile ready

Undoubtedly, a white label social network can get many communities started.  Some work-arounds can easily be figured out for some of the more specialized needs such as task and file management.  For example, Google Spreadsheets can be used to track and manage tasks while Google Drive can support file sharing and management.

If white label social networks are not your thing, I just got a tour of a new solution called Veoci that has many social network like qualities with the added benefit of tightly integrated task, file and member management.  Though a relatively new solution, this platform is quite mature and robust.  I like how easy it is to use.  If you can figure out Facebook and Asana, you can pretty much understand how Veoci works.  I suspect for subset of communities, Veoci as the more costly and robust solution is an absolute necessity.

For many others though, I am curious if white label platforms like Ning.com can serve a similar function?  Has anyone tried this or is willing to try it?

Would You Use Airbnb in a Disaster? Airbnb is Planning on It!

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airbnb During disasters, many people and families become displaced until they can return to their homes.  Whether it be due to lack of power, a bad water supply, or dangerous conditions, displaced people need a place to stay.  Red Cross shelters often pick up the slack here as the designated short-term shelters.  However, Airbnb, a web-based housing marketplace, is betting on the generosity and kindness of ordinary citizens to help those affected by a disaster.  The company wants to empower citizens to take action through its platform.

Airbnb announced today that they will formally support hosts and guests in need during disasters.  In the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, Airbnb stepped up to the plate to offer fee-free rentals in disaster affected communities.  The company established a dedicated landing page that allowed hosts to offer their apartments for free.  All this was hacked together in the wee-hours of the disaster and resulted in the rental of over 1,400 free or discounted properties during the Hurricane.

These hacks are now permanent.  Airbnb modified its system to allow these features to be easily deployed within 30 minutes of being notified.  According to its blog, Airbnb will:

  • "Allow local residents with extra space to host those in need.
  • Allow existing hosts to donate their rooms for free to those in need.
  • Make all Airbnb bookings in areas affected by a natural disaster fee-free.
  • Email hosts in the affected area, asking them if they are able to help.
  • Connect guests to hosts that have space to offer in the affected area via a dynamic landing page.
  • Provide Airbnb’s 24/7 customer support, Trust & Safety tools, Host Guarantee and other services regularly available to Airbnb hosts.
  • Provide general disaster response information to guests and hosts."

This undoubtedly shakes up the existing model of government/non-profit sheltering dependence.  Is this something your organization would promote?  Plan for?  Develop partnerships around?

Airbnb also made this great promo video!

http://youtu.be/LJgRwdIGyRs

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Disaster Research & Innovation: Where is The Information Gap?

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I have a great interest in the intersection between disaster policy, management and technology.  I am constantly thinking of these relationships and how best to research them.  But more than that, I am very interested in where practitioners have ongoing information gaps related to disaster research and innovation.   New advances are being made constantly and it is important to connect all communities to achieve effective outcomes. So my question to the community...

What disaster-related information or topics would you like to know more about in your jobs?  And how would you like to receive this information?

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Disasters and Technology: How We Are Innovating in a Network Age

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In recent years, there has been a wave of innovation in domestic and humanitarian disaster management aided by the advancement of social tools and other technologies.  At a more micro-level, we have already seen a couple distinct behaviors: 1) the applicability of non-disaster tools and techniques, and 2) the emergence of new operating norms.  These behaviors are leading us to question our long held understandings of disaster management and if they are even still relevant. As an example, UN OCHA just released this groundbreaking report on Humanitarianism in the Network Age that starts to set the future agenda.  And in disasters, we are continually challenged by scalability, complex interdependencies and unvalidated planning assumptions.  The report as well as a number of innovative movements are poised to fundamentally change our previous assumptions in light of new technological capabilities, innovations and most of all, open data.

The Relevance of Non-Disaster for Disaster

Waze navigatiescherm

In many ways, disaster management has been a discipline unto itself. However, we have been careful to recognize the interdisciplinary nature of our work. With the recent entrepreneurial boom, we have seen a number of non-disaster applications being re-routed for disaster use in addition to the regular social media applications and networks. Simply said, they are simple applications that are easy to use AND scale for disasters purposes.  Additionally, they leverage the "crowd" in ways that do NOT force them into a jurisdictions propriety application or user licenses.

We have seen Waze (crowdsourced mapping info), Geofeedia (geolocated social media intelligence) and Splunk (big data intelligence) being applied to disaster management in ways never intended by their creators. Geofeedia is a great example of this. The application was originally intended to meet the situational awareness needs of Fortune 500 firms for brand and reputation management.  Now it is being applied to a number of use cases for public safety.

The advantage in applying non-disaster applications toward disaster use cases is also that vendors are better able to capitalize on economies of scale to produce better and more usable products at cheaper costs.  This is an important advantage in the increasingly budget conscious world.  We need to be able to do more with less and there are many non-disaster products that allow us to achieve this.  However, the real challenge in the coming years is to identify best practices to use both social media, social networks and other applications for collective action across organizations and across the public.

Social media applications are also becoming our platforms of choice for information sharing both internally and externally. PIOs and other communications personnel that are using social media to engage their stakeholders are also starting to explore explore the potential use cases for collective action. After all, the true first responders are the people that are right there in the moment.  Of course, research is still ongoing in this domain.  As many of my colleagues have pointed out, social media is here to stay, so we get on this bandwagon.  But the real trick is determining best practices and ensuring they become widespread through research and training.

yammer main

Internally, enterprise social networks are increasingly being used for organizational information sharing and collaboration. They are ideal semi-structured data and information networks that enable those "serendipitous effects" that often come from networking and working out loud. This is very similar to social media, but with a trusted or verified network.  They can also become your incident management software with the right planning.  The key takeaway from this is that the more chances there are for information discovery, the more chances there are for "serendipitous effects" that lead to more effective and efficient responses.

New Operating Norms

Most notably social media have advanced how organizations respond to crises. The biggest shift thus far has been seen in the public information realm where PIOs and communications personnel are harnessing the power of social media to disseminate important information before, during and after disasters. They are learning to engage their audiences better, but as they do so, are realizing how they must shift the way they operate to effectively respond and engage sufficiently.

VOSG is a prime example of this. Started by Jeff Phillips and company, the VOSG concepts capitalizes on digitally skilled volunteers (aka Digital Volunteerism) to help manage communications and information during a disaster.  The "command" structure is now being adapted to include skilled volunteers that do not come from traditional first responder rank and file.  Crisis Mappers uses this model and is working with the Qatar Institute to research the efficacy of digital volunteer "micro-tasking."

Occupy

During Hurricane Sandy, Occupy Sandy became what I like to call an "emergent network."  Emergent networks are groups of people that form DURING a disaster and who organize themselves for action without official authority or permission.  They are generally a mix of skilled and non-skilled volunteers that help compliment the response by addressing community-based needs.  These networks also operate in a collective response model that often leads to cooperation without coordination.

The Qatar Institute and Project EPIC are also looking at how social media data can be applied to intelligent operations, including the meaning of aggregated social data. The more we understand data's value, the more questions that can be answered with aggregated data.

As a result, many research institutions are looking into how best to leverage this for operations. What information is relevant? What format is the best? Who should receive it?  How?  When? What actions should be taken on it? How should it be mashed with intuition, experience and other anecdotal information? We have many questions to answer on this front, but one things is for sure, the ability to access and act upon data and information is growing rapidly.

Conclusion

Generally, the more response networks the better.  However, the real the challenge is not to create too many sandboxes (operational structures/networks).  Just think how many local, regional and Federal sandboxes there are now?  Better yet, how many functional (i.e., healthcare, transportation, firefighting) sandboxes there are?  There are just too many and we can greatly benefit from system data and information from all sandboxes if they were tied together in an effective manner.

Also, responses are no longer "controlled" by a designated organization   As such, response becomes an equally participatory process in which all parties choose to play in the same sandbox.  The more they play well together, the better the outcomes.   Technology is the great enabler for this as collaboration becomes easier and as new information sharing standards are  being developed and adopted.

Technology today is beginning to allow us to aggregate and dis-aggregate all this planning and information sharing across all levels and types of  the response.  Let's plan for the capabilities we have now and in the future; not the capabilities of the past where technology was the great "limiter" instead of the great "enabler."

#OpenData and Disaster Management

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Beth NoveckAs I reflect on the past month in my Government 3.0 class with Beth Noveck, I am reminded of how much I am learning and how much it relates to my current and future work in Disaster Management.  Overall, this class is an opportunity to learn about concurrent and ongoing initiatives that are furthering the goals of government and its constituents.  But more importantly, the class has allowed me to translate the many things going on government wide to the unique challenges of Disaster Management.
Specifically, disaster management suffers from a lack of "open data" from which to address some of the unique challenges such as scalability and the infrequency of events.

The Unique Challenges of Disaster Management

Scalability.  We plan and prepare for events the best we can by building response capacity and training our staff, volunteers, and partners to respond appropriately; but at the end of the day when a disaster strikes, we need more resources that help us deal with the volumes of information and needs that are coming from every direction.  In addition, the more complex the incident, the more important effective coordination is as more and more response partners join the response.

The more data that is easily available in machine readable format, the more we can innovate with better applications that allow us to slice and dice data to turn it into actionable information for decision-making at all levels and parts of the response.  As a result, we as the collective response can make more informed real-time decisions that begin to really do the greatest good for the greatest number.  The more people (citizens included) with access to the right information at the right time can help alleviate the response burdens of governments and non-profits during major disasters.

Exceptional Emergency Management volunteers re...

High Impact/Low Frequency.  Many industries benefit from the mounds of data they sit on for consistent and repeatable events and processes.  As a result, they are better able to learn and adapt to better manage risk.  However, we are often planning for sentinel events that we may or may not know will occur and for which we often don't know the exact impacts.  As a result, we make many planning assumptions based on a combination of scientific evidence, experience and pure conjecture.  We need better "response data" to validate our assumptions and activities.  What is it about our response that really worked well?  How come?

We work hard to complete after action reports that detail lessons learned and document best practices.  LLIS.gov contains a lot of these reports that are accessible to other industry professionals.  But who has the time to sift through everything?  What if you could slice and dice all the information from every report to help answer your specific questions?  What what if we could index all of the data and information contained in these documents to identify national trends?   Our ability to learn from our past would skyrocket.

Open data is not just about the ability to view it, it is about the ability to mash it together to gain new insights that were previously undetectable.

However, our existing evidence-base is largely anecdotal and based on subject matter expertise only.  Ongoing research is changing our understanding of management and coordination, but decisions are still made this way based on anecdotal evident and expertise.  So what if we could add meaningful metrics and data to the equation?  Essentially, open data would help us review not what worked and what didn't, but the degree to which it worked or didn't work.  Data can come from internal systems or even external systems.  The more "open" and available it is, the better chance we have to collect meaningful data that helps us learn from our past.

Interdependencies.  If we could everything alone, we wouldn't be facing many of the challenges we face today.  However, we need to balance the anticipated risk with our capabilities in a fiscally responsible,  yet politically acceptable manner.   So we turn to our neighbors, non-profits, private sector organizations and other government agencies to become force multipliers.   This creates significant coordination and management challenges as the list grows and grows.  We need more data about what these relationships look like.

English: Datasets in the Linking Open Data pro...

Data allows us to actually map interdependencies that could potentially result in catastrophic failures during an event.   We can also better identify and prioritize these interdependencies to help improve system resielence.  After all, regardless of where or how we operate, we ALWAYS operate in some sort of system that has to work together in order to perform well.  MindAlliance has a great tool that helps organizations identify gaps and weakness is their preparedness.  With additional data, we can further validate planning assumptions in relationship to our dependencies to help distribute risk as best as possible.

English: President Clinton spends a moment wit...Government Led, Community Reliant.  Building off the issues with interdependencies, we also have a mismatch occurring in that initiatives are often government led, but effective responses to disasters are extraordinarily community reliant.  President Obama and FEMA have picked up on this issue with their "Whole Community" approach outlined in PPD-8.  But in moving forward, do we have the resources needed for a true "Whole Community" approach?  In the past, many great initiatives have simply failed due to a lack of funding or time (or the next disaster).

Data will help us prioritize our efforts for maximum effectiveness.  And if the whole community is to participate, they need to data in which to help.  The more data we can work with, we can turn planning and interdependency "assumptions" into "factual" planning points that leave us better prepared for the impacts we actually face, not just what we "think" we face.  Essentially, open data can really help us perform better risk and gap analyses to better inform our mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery efforts.

"Zero Fail."  This term has been thrown around a lot in the industry.  Most often, it is used in the context of fear for trying something new.  Essentially, we need to do what we know works in order to not "fail."  Hurricanes Katrina, Ike, Gustav, Irene, and Sandy are quickly showing how inadequate this assumption is.  Our missions are extraordinarily important, but failures are how we learn best.  I would take this a step further and argue that mini-failures are likely the best way of learning.  Eric Reis's book The Lean Startup, provides some great anecdotes for failing fast, but still accomplishing the mission.

Developing an "experimentation" culture based on real-time and meaningful data is essential.  Data will helps us fail fast, while still helping us accomplish our mission.  As a result, we can better identify ways to mitigate failure in the future and maximize the effectiveness of our response.  We are always hailed as a "dynamic" industry; but what if we could be even more dynamic to fail and react in the moment?  What if we could change course easily?  Open data enables these things.  Granted, some of this may be a few years off, but it highlights what is possible, even more so than we might think!

Overall, #OpenData represents one of the most important ways we can learn and advance the industry better when dealing with the unique challenges of the industry.

What do you think?  Have you had any wins with OpenData at your organization or in your community?  What have you been able to build with open data?

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Innovation at the Sahana Software Foundation: Interview with Mark Prutsalis

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Today, I had the pleasure of interviewing Mark Prutsalis from the Sahana Software Foundation.  We spoke for a while on the history and vision for Sahana, a non-profit organization developing open source software for disaster management and humanitarian needs.  In recent years, it has had a lot of success and is poised to continue. Some highlights from the audio below:

  • Sahana was built by a local technology group in the aftermath if the Indian Ocean Tsunami in 2004.
  • In 2009, the local technology group discovered they had a different mission and Mark took it over as part of the Sahana Software Foundation.
  • New York City, Los Angeles, and International Red Cross all use Sahana software.
  • Current software version is "hard to use out of the box" and development focus right now is on project requirements.
  • There are plans to become more strategic and shift to an "expert system" that is easier to implement and has features based on best practices, not just customer requirements.  Hosted solutions and less technical and operational customization will be required in the future.
  • However, Sahana is trying to build solutions that don't yet exist in the market.
  • The ability to scale operations with hundreds of thousands of people and sites is a priority for Sahana to better enable real-time planning and management.
  • Haiti earthquake in 2010 was a "watershed moment" for Sahana where it was able to crowdsource and geo-locate almost all 150-160 hospitals in Haiti within 24 hours.  Only two couldn't be geo-located.  Sahana, in partnership with OpenStreetMap, used geo-rectification to confirm crowdsourced locations.

Check out the audio for the complete 15 minute interview!  (sorry for the initial background noise, but audio is still clear)

[soundcloud url="http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/82283668" params="" width=" 100%" height="166" iframe="true" /]

To PhD, or Not to PhD...What Do You Think?

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A couple weeks ago I found out I was accepted to the George Washington University School of Engineering and Applied Science PhD program in Crisis, Emergency, and Risk Management. This is an amazing opportunity I am grateful for, but realize there are some drawbacks as well.  Rather than contemplate these decisions by myself, my close contacts and my PhD advisor (who I believe will be awesome and supportive of my pursuits), I thought I would ask my fellow followers to add their thoughts, opinions, and experiences to help inform our decision (this is joint decision with my girlfriend).  Below are my top pros/cons:

Intellectual Curiosity

Diagram of the gown, hood and bonnet used in g...The biggest thing driving me to pursue a PhD is the intellectual curiosity I have, especially with so many unique and amazing things taking place in the industry.  Social media has taken the industry by storm and technology is changing the way disasters are managed.  As a result, there are so many unanswered questions, especially empirically.  Patrick Meier and others are already doing great work in this area, especially with big data and analytics.  They are pushing the bounds of what is possible and I look forward to addressing the challenges of implementing these cutting edge solutions.

The chief questions I have are:  How is social media and technology transforming the way we operate?  What is the best way to organize and respond given these enabling tools?  Essentially, I want to help define how we as emergency managers, communities, citizens, organizations, governments, etc. respond well in a "Networked Age."  It is no longer sufficient to attack problems uni-dimensionally; we must attack them holistically, empirically, and multi-dimensionally in order to thrive in this increasing complex world.  Ultimately, I hope to look at the issues from an organizational design perspective.

This is an exciting time and I think the time is now to go for it, except....

Financial Concerns

Money Woes

I am thankful that I will be receiving free tuition and a stipend in exchange for my half-time work conducting research.  However, this stipend is small and forces me to work on a tight budget.  In addition, I have not earned any significant income for the past two years while pursuing my MPA from NYU Wagner and have incurred significant student loan debt.  I am feeling a bit drained at this point and am not looking forward to additional years scraping by and incurring additional interest on my loans (payments can be deferred).

While I have some consulting opportunities in the hopper to help supplement my income, they are not consistent and there is no guarantee that they will be there throughout my tenure.  Also, and very importantly, given that I am in a serious relationship, I want to be secure in providing for the many future milestones that are sure to come.

Post-Graduate

If you have ever met me, you'll know that one of my strongest attributes is the ability to network.  While I am confident I will get to know many of the right people over the course of the next few years, I am still at a loss as to what to do after receiving the degree.  Obtaining a PhD certainly prepares me for teaching, researching and consulting, but I am unsure of what path might be best for me.  Additionally, each has its pros and cons (thoughts?).  While rejoining the workforce as a practitioner is also a possibility, I may be over-qualified for many of the positions.

I also realize there are so many good things going on that I am like a kid in a candy store not knowing where to begin.  I can't do it all (not enough time in a day), so where do I draw the line?  In some ways, I am trying to have faith that it will all work out.  In other ways, I am trying to be strategic about it.  For all I know, my future job may not have been thought of yet!

The Big Move

English: Divine Moving in one of NYC west vill...

My story in a nutshell...I grew up in the NYC suburbs, spent a total of five years in Denver, CO for undergraduate and working in EMS, then moved to Arlington, VA for three years where I was a Disaster Management consultant, then back to NYC for the past two years to pursue my MPA at NYU Wagner.  I have done some moving in my time and feel comfortable with it.

But this time is different.  I have someone else in the picture and this is a big decision for both of us.  She has built a life here in NYC and moving, while exciting in some ways, is not so exciting in others.  For one, there is the question of her finding a job in the DC metro area as an elementary school  teacher.   This is a big issue.  We are exploring all the avenues, but if we miss the cycle for hiring this year, it will be very difficult to find a job during the year.  Additionally, she is leaving tenure and a prestigious elementary school to move.  Will she be able to find something comparable and secure in the DC area?

Parting Thoughts

Decision time is coming soon.  It is a tough decision and I would love your thoughts...

Do I go do a PhD, or continue working as a practitioner or consultant?  What are the pros and cons of either from your perspective?

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A DHS That is Truly Open and Collaborative...Are You Sure?

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open government data - simple venn diagram Who would ever think that "homeland security" information and collaboration should and could be public?  Well, President Obama did when he signed his Open Government Directive on December 8, 2009.  The Directive, authored by The Office of Management and Budget at the White House, outlined three key principles to Open Government:  transparency, participation and collaboration.

Currently, Russia is exploring this issue as well to become part of the Open Government Partnership.  OGP is a partnership among over 50 counties (and counting) that support AND have a plan to implement their version of Open Government according to the Open Government Declaration.  There are strict eligibility requirements and Russia has unveiled a bold and aggressive approach (OGP Plan and Action Plan).  However, there are some takeaways from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security's Open Government Plan that will aid Russia in its efforts to open government.

In June 2011, The U.S. Department of Homeland Security released its Open Government Plan 2.0 (Version 1 was released in April 2010), signaling its intent to meet the demands of the OMB directive.  Given the organization's broad and expanding mission, though, DHS has a number of lessons learned from developing its Open Government framework:

  1. The Value of Culture
  2. Collaboration and The Great Enabler of Technology
  3. The Complexity of the Future

The Value of Culture

One of the most notable absences from the framework is a cultural commitment to how Open Government should exist at DHS.  Culture is a key component of any change management initiative.  DHS notes in its Plan, "[t]he Department established a governance structure consisting of senior executives and managers to form various working groups within the Department to institutionalize Open Government at DHS."

This vague description of action, though, ponders the question of how to invoke a culture of Open Government at DHS?  In fact, with only senior executives and managers part of the working groups, how is DHS supposed to develop initiatives that reflect the experience, expertise and needs of the its employees and stakeholders?  Where is representation from private industry including critical infrastructure and non-profits such as the American Red Cross?

The lesson here is to include all stakeholders in the discussion of change.  They can offer different perspectives and act as evangelists when the time comes to implement.  The initiatives can also amass a following that allow for natural cultural change.  The more momentum an initiative has among the key people involved, the more chance of success it breads.

Collaboration and The Great Enabler of Technology

Technology is not the answer to all concerns.  However, technology is a great enabler that allows action not previously considered.  While "working groups" are often the agent of change at Federal departments and agencies, the form and function are beginning to change as collaborative technologies like social networks, feedback systems, and project management tools enable a collective voice to be heard and then to be acted upon.

Technology is a given

In DHS's Open Government Plan 2.0, IdeaScale ( a stakeholder engagement tool employed by GSA) was mentioned to help with dialogue around cybersecurity and national preparedness.  However, collaboration is more than the sum of the disparate and uncoordinated activities.  Collaboration is the strategic approach to stakeholder engagement.  And today, technology enables better and more robust models of collaboration that can reach far and wide.

These tools allow for better innovation and more effective change by capturing the thoughts and ideas of the many in a comprehensible and organized manner.  They also value the expertise (or non-expertise depending how you look at it) of an energized group of people ready to help government prosper, thereby breading change from the bottom up vs. top down.  And top-down approaches are often considered costly and ineffective, especially when no attention is paid to culture.

The lesson here is to develop better processes of citizen and stakeholder engagement to influence change and innovation.  Technology now allows new forms of collaboration that can rally significant numbers in support of various initiatives.  No longer does the burden of response, especially at DHS, rely solely on the capabilities of government actors.  Embrace the power of the people and think carefully before stymieing their efforts through bureaucratic "leadership" where progress is controlled by policy decisions.

The Complexity of the Future

In addition to being complex, the future is also a bit unknown!  However, the actions we take now help dictate the future.  And the largest benefit will be in developing a foundation of change, innovation and openness.  The more we can build "adaptive capacity" into DHS's DNA, the better we will be able to handle the future full of risks and opportunities that lead to a better and more open government at DHS.

In its Open Government Plan 2.0, DHS speaks a lot of the National Information Exchange Model, "a federally-supported, government-wide initiative to that helps communities of people with common mission interests connect and exchange information in order to successfully and efficiently accomplish their missions."  Overall, I support this endeavor with the caveat that this becomes the new Data.gov and contains models for non-governmental access.  Data.gov was a great version 1 attempt to begin releasing data.  However, the dynamic nature of homeland security requires real-time, relevant and multi-directional information to perform its missions, especially in collaboration with the private and non-profit sectors who are indispensable in this arena.

But the real lesson in building a solid foundation for the future is to understand what homeland security and the Country will look like in 5, 10, or 15 years.  Developing this strategic thought will help build a better foundation today.  In fact, one foundational initiative I already see is the need to develop an "open by default" data policy in which ALL (and I mean ALL) data can easily be accessed through well-defined standard interfaces that can handle the computing load.  The Wilson Center also offers some guidance on how to achieve the "open by default" strategy.  Specific data access rights can come later, but the important thing is to prepare the technology to open data for other agencies, the private sector, non-profits and citizens.  Ultimately, you don't know what you have to open until all your cards on the table!

Parting Thoughts

DHS and Russia have a lot of progress ahead of it, especially as they operate in very different cultural and political environments.  However, the support of Open Government is apparent at highest levels of both countries.  The important thing is to not destroy the concept of Open Government by developing plans in a bubble, but rather expanding the collaborative process to citizens, private industry, non-profits, etc.

For Russia, building a strong foundation in which to expand is essential.  Utilize the energy of the people to help transform government for the better.  Empower your officials at all levels of government to engage and collaborate with the public.  Sometimes you just do know everything until you ask everyone!

Smartphone Apps, the Next Step for Emergency Management?

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I love the idea of mobile first strategy when it comes to applications. We are increasingly virtual and need the flexibility our phones offer to input and receive relevant information.My question, though, is is a mobile application by jurisdiction the best way to go since the public and other citizen responders are not bounded by jurisdiction, but rather geography?

Evernote and My Life...Symbiotic!

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Image representing Evernote as depicted in Cru... For a while, I have heard of Evernote in passing and never sat down to understand the application.  Now that I am a graduate student, though, I can't imagine how I ever survived without it!  For those that don't know, Evernote helps you:

"remember everything, communicate effectively and get things done."

With this broad mission, I asked myself, what could I really use it for?

Well, it turns out that I actually have a HUGE need to remember everything, communicate effectively, and get things done!  Before I get into the details, it is important to know why I have predicament in the first place.

Background

Frankly, we are moving from a knowledge worker society to a knowledge management society in which real-time knowledge over a breadth of topics is often valued more than a deep vertical expertise.  In essence, we are becoming experts in just a few clicks.  Whether you are trying to look up a definition or information on something or someone, Wikipedia and LinkedIn are key tools for getting smart, quick.

In addition, our sources of information have also grown exponentially.  We need to keep up with all the various information sharing platforms in order to  keep up with trends and maintain our expertise.  From Twitter to Facebook and beyond, there are hundreds of platforms with information to keep track of.  It has become expected that you keep up with them or risk becoming irrelevant.

Well, I figured out very fast how to organize all my sources of information but was left with this burning question:  What now?  There was simply no way to easily retain everything and also share with others over time.  Social media and other communications tend to be more real-time and don't "hold" information for search well.  This is compounded further when you operate on many different platforms!

Remembering Everything

Evernote's ability to collect almost anything (i.e., articles, pictures, PDFs, URLs, etc.) directly from the browser or phone enables seamless "filing."  I can easily select the notebook and add any tags as I capture the content.

For my Government 3.0 class, I am constantly coming across articles and PDFs of interest for future blog posts.  As I do so, I read, then capture the content directly to Evernote for a later date when I am ready to write.  When I am ready to write, I can easily reference the material on any of my devices (phone, tablet and two computers) and by completing simple searches or navigating directly to my Government 3.0 notebook.  No longer do I have to remember where I put it.

But wait, what if the content is directly related the notes I just took in class or a meeting I just had?  Well, I can merge the notes together, place them in the same notebook, and/or tag them with the same information.  Essentially, disparate content and information can easily be merged if they share any similar characteristics.

Communicating Effectively

There is no doubt we are in the age of teams and collaboration!  This means that effective communication is a must in order to be successful.  Tools are popping up all over the place that assist with this, but I have found Evernote to be the one that most suits my needs at the moment.  It is fairly priced (free to $45/year) and is the simplest to use and sync across all my devices.

Evernote's sharing features allow me to share notes via email or social media and share notebooks with collaborators and the public.  Working on my capstone project for my MPA, our team decided to dump our research, articles, thoughts, meeting notes, etc. into one shared notebook for easy reference.  This comes in handy as we all have access to the material for related blog posts and conversations that we will create or have over the duration of the project.  The search features combined with tagging also allow us to hone in on what we are looking for very easily.

But what if it is something important that everyone should be aware of right away?  Share your note with your collaborators via email directly from any Evernote interface.  And what if I receive an email reply from a subject matter expert?  Copy and paste into Evernote?  NO!  Send your email to your personal Evernote email address.  The email will automatically be uploaded and synced.  Use the "@" symbol followed by the notebook name for the email to get automatically filed in the appropriate notebook.

Getting Things Done

Of course, getting things done is a huge part of being a graduate student.  I am often so busy with classes, projects, student council, consulting and professional development that I rarely have time to keep it all straight and organized.  Evernote helps me easily stay organized with all the important emails, articles, and other messages I receive and want to remember.  With these concerns off my plate, I can concentrate on getting things done.

Many people also use Evernote to develop their To-Do Lists.  Evernote is certainly a great product for this, but my life (in terms of task management) is a bit more complicated.  As such, my preference is to use Wunderlist for task management.  It allows me to group and schedule my tasks and even schedule repetitive tasks such as laundry, paying the bills, food shopping, etc.  The subtask feature also helps identify min-tasks that lead up to the larger task at hand.  The application is also available on every device I have and has collaboration features.

Wunderlist iPad

Parting Thoughts

Evernote is a tool that makes my life easier...much easier!  But what has really helped me succeed and to be productive is my approach.  I have given a lot of thought to my personality, work habits and needs when it comes to being productive.  As such, I was able to select the right tools for me, of which Evernote is a major part.

P.S. It is unlikely that one solution will meet all of your needs.  However, with some advance strategic thought, you can reduce the number of solutions to a few.

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