The Auditorium is jam packed for the last session of the day with Peter Jones and Sir Gus O’Donnell on encouraging entrepreneurial spirit and innovation in the public service. We’re now in front of an edited version of Dragon’s Den/Lions’ Lair for public services. We’re starting late as the Prince of Wales had to be escorted from the building. [JJ's note: I assume he wasn't chucked out :)]

16:09 Gus O’Donnell introduces Peter Jones. Peter Jones says hello to everyone and Gus & Pete have a chat before we show a clip from last year’s Lions’ Lair.

16:12 Jones says he was surprised that O’Donnell found it difficult to communicate the value of a directory of civil pages. Took the idea from last year and it’s now built. Very hard when you are in the Cabinet Office to communicate the idea. O’Donnell now has started a quarterly email to communicate innovations.

[JJ's note: what's the bet that Amplified's coverage of Civil Service Live will be more effective as a commujnications tool than a quarterly email newsletter???]

16:15 Jones says the difficulty is in celebrating success. Jones says he was skeptical that the things we were talking about were going to work. We should celebrate the success of the directory. [round of applause]

16:16 Jones says the quality of the ideas in Lions’ Lair is substantively better this year compared with last year. [shows clip of this year's programme]

[JJ's note: nice, but can we please just see the ideas so we can assess them? If this is about ways to enhance the civil service make it better and communicate better, then volunteering that communication process is a damned good idea. Kudos to COI for getting Amplified on board.]

16:20 [a couple of clips are shown about improving processes] Jones notes how sad it is that passionate engagement still isn’t being recognised in the civil service and bureaucracy and process has stalled their idea development. O’Donnell says this is the best and worst of the civil service. Best practice is being strangled by current bureaucratic practice.

16:28 Jones asks whether there are people in the audience who feel their ideas are not worth pursuing. Half the audience raise their hands. Jones follows up with the question ‘who would like an Ask Gus! engine in the site?’. Almost everyone raises their hand. O’Donnell agreed to make it happen.

16:30 [Clip showing Cabinet office idea on learning and development hub online] Narrative and story telling on civil service activities and to provide raw material for training purposes was proposed and accepted - this is a change from previous practice in that it allows sharing resources and information that perhaps previously was not considered acceptable. Jones impressed with the training element embedded in the story-telling platform.

16:40 Superhero Gus doll is presented as an idea, but Gus said it won’t happen. Jones now trying to convince O’Donnell that the doll should be made because the message behind it is that people want to have vision and leadership. Not just from O’Donnell, but from other leaders in the civil service, empowering them to make things happen. O’Donnell says he has met superheroes who are civil servants around the world - not just in military, but in agriculture, building communities and welfare workers. All these people are superheroes and no idol should drawattention away from these efforts. [JJ's note: perhaps then the civil service should be highlighting these efforts more effectively *beyond* the civil service community?] Jones maintains that we still need to celebrate the successes and he will continue to promote the work in the private sector.

16:48 This year Jones notes there is a key sponsor for all ideas in Lions’ Lair that are being supported. This is a change from last year.

Questions

Dept of Bus - a lot of the examples today based around technology. A lot of the changes needed are about people. Do you have a good idea for how people can transfer from department and department more easily?

O’Donnell: better to ‘get out’ and see different operations to understand how better to operate. Practical things needed to harmonise conditions on maternity pay, leave. trying to deal with that but of course every dept is an employer.

Treasury - a lot of the ideas are about 2-way commujnication. Often difficult to get people to share ideas. What can we do to incentivise sharing?

O’Donnell: when we’re doing capability reviews this is a common problem. Now we have a team in the Cabinet office to share ideas. Need to be more confident about sharing both successes and failures.

Jones: Biggest thing is more to do with political governancve as much as security. There is clearly a need for more private sector concepts into the civil service where there is widely acceptable content transmission via blogs. This might be useful. Might get Sir Gus on twitter. [Sir Gus said not gonna happen.]

Q: should we have more regional civil services live events and should we partner with commercial organisations to communicate the activities?

O’Donnell: yes we did Sage at Gateshead Civil Services Live and it was great. We need to do more of these. Jones attended [Jones: it was the end of the earth]. O’Donnell asks Jones if partnering with commercial groups would be feasible.

Jones: Not sure. Sage at Gateshead event was fantastic. Was initailly concerned but the visit to the job centre articulated an easy and simple system

[JJ's note - I note he does not continue on commercial partners.]

O’Donnell: Yes we moved parliament around and that was usccessful. Must do the same here.

Q: Is there an opportunity to make the public see what the civil service are doing in a half day exhbition?

O’Donnell: two ways we’re trying to get in to that - getting the civil service to talk to one another about what is happening, and promoting the great things happening therein. Haven’t thought of getting the public in due to issues. We are trying to capture a lot of wheat we’re doing on film. Politics show on Sunday will be presenting these issues.

Jones: Asks the audience to indicate whether they want Gus to wear Peter Jones socks next year. [Lots of hands]

That’s about it - see you tomorrow folks!