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Meet the Modern Civil Service: Sue Bateman

Sue Bateman, Chief Data Officer (Interim), CDDO

  Hello! Welcome to the third interview in the Meet the Modern Civil Service series. The aim of this series is to showcase the people in the civil service who are innovating change, whether that be through being a learning …

The innovation book club: great reads to give a hoot about!

An owl sitting on a chair reading a book.

What are the best books to read on innovation? We asked a range of leaders across the Civil Service for favourite literary recommendations to inspire innovative thinking, from popular guides to to inspirational novels, with a few videos and podcasts …

One Big Thing 2023: putting the ‘big’ in big data!

OBT learning highlights

The Civil Service launched One Big Thing on 4 September 2023, as a new annual initiative for civil servants to take shared action each year around a reform priority.  Our theme for 2023 was data skills and we committed to …

Harnessing the power of local statistics with ONS

UK Statistics Authority building

A guest blog from ONS. We all know that working out what's actually happening on the ground can be difficult. Linking national data to where people live and work is often a challenge for many civil servants, especially when you’re …

Embedding a culture of innovation

A trio of civil servants at a sprint event.

In our previous article Building an Innovative Civil Service we talked about how innovation is fundamental to continually deliver value to the public. Innovation can be abstract and we want to highlight how important culture is in fostering psychological safety …

How the MOD is creating Psychologically Safe environments to enable project success

Three soldiers on a dark beach

Evidence shows psychologically safe teams are more productive, innovative, and better at exposing and managing risk. Psychological Safety is a key enabler in building an innovative culture, high-performing teams, and promotes testing new ideas, whether they are successful or not. …

Project Simplify: Keeping it simple

Project Simplify supports an Innovative Civil Service which is focused on rewarding and encouraging our staff to find innovative solutions to problems in order to deliver better outcomes for the public. Since the Machinery of Government change to create the …

The '1 Atlantic Square Model' to building an inclusive office community

The Glasgow HQ building

A guest blog from the Glasgow Community Management team. Building and nurturing a thriving, inclusive community in offices, campuses and hubs across the UK is an essential part of attracting and retaining local talent, while creating an inspiring and collaborative …

Building an Innovative Civil Service

Civil servants at the One Big Conference on data in November 2023

  A Modern Civil Service is our vision of a skilled, innovative and ambitious organisation equipped for the future. We've discussed what we mean by 'skilled', but what do we mean by 'innovative'?" Innovation has a wide range of applications, …

A Skilled Civil Service: the Policy Profession

Policy profession showcase in the South West

A guest blog by Toyin Owolabi, Policy Profession HR Business Partner Civil Service policy professionals live and work in locations all across the UK. Some are based in cities, others in more rural areas. Regardless of location, they live alongside …