Montgomery County encourages copying as a creative act

Like Govlaunch, Michael Baskin, Chief Innovation Officer for Montgomery County, is a believer in copying what works from others. In this episode, we take a closer look at some of Montgomery County’s projects that have been inspired by others, proving that some great innovation can happen when leveraging resources already available.

The best part? Nobody wasted time reinventing the wheel.

So much of the buzz around innovation is tech-centric. After all, technology is enabling more efficient work from automating to digitizing critical functions of government. And while Baskin will acknowledge the role of tech in driving some innovation, he and his team are focused on their people and leveraging that strength to build a more innovative and “human government.” Baskin says:

“We’re growing the government’s ability to change behavior for better outcomes - using a mix of methods from service design and behaviorally informed nudging to process improvement and $ Liberating Structures$ . We’re stretching towards a vision of just, liberating, and human government.”

With the onus placed on Baskin’s team to collaborate and think creatively to solve problems and engage with community when possible, innovation at all levels is happening daily. He says:

“In Montgomery County, our vision for innovation is rooted in changing behavior to produce better outcomes for those we serve.”

We at Govlaunch applaud this notion - because governments of any size or budget and can put some (if not all) of Montgomery County’s work into action.



Stop reinventing the wheel

Baskin is a huge proponent of “creatively copying” what works from others. From $ outcome based budgeting$  to bringing $ frontline customer service staff all into one central location$  for the customer to emulating best practices for training and staff engagement, Montgomery County has worked with others such as Seattle, Madison and Denver to iterate and improve its operations.

Baskin shares the example from his time leading innovation in Chattanooga, TN of their work with PEAK Academy coming out of Denver:

“We’ve experimented with different trainings and learnings, and finally, we got frustrated. We just copied. So we called up in Denver, we stole their peak Academy model. And we literally took their PowerPoint deck, we put a white box over the word Denver, used all Denver examples, and just ran with it. And over time we totally evolved it to be more of our own.”

The key with innovation is to be able to try new things and to iterate quickly. And what better way than using a template from someone else’s success and modeling it to be your own?

We’ve seen other local governments working to make information more open and accessible, from $ San Rafael, CA’s project management guide$  to London Borough of Camden’s $ Citizen Engagement Playbook$  for planning matters, and through the Govlaunch platform, $ these resources$  can be shared and searchable for others.

Find a resource for innovation insights

The Montgomery County Innovation team isn't coming up with these ideas in a vacuum. They are lucky to have leaders with strong networks in local government. Baskin himself has served on the $ Boston Mayor’s Youth Council$  and led innovation in Chattanooga prior to his current role in Montgomery County. He is also an advisor to the $ Foundation for Civic Leadership$  working to build networks of cities to ensure 100% civic participation including helping launch $ CitiesVote with the National League of Cities$  and Democracy Fellows with the National Conference on Citizenship .

But what about those in local government without these robust resumes or connections?

We’ve built Govlaunch to help bridge this information and sharing gap for all public servants, regardless of network size or experience. The wiki is designed for local government staff at all levels to quickly and easily search for innovative projects and tools being leveraged by others.

Our hope is to inspire local governments of every size to succeed in creating better futures for all of us through innovation.

As an innovator and thought leader on Govlauch, Baskin shares:

“The idea of open access is something that I really love about Govlaunch. Innovation is for everyone. Innovation for us, and for me is about making things better. It's as simple as that.”

Listen to the full episode to learn more about Montgomery County’s role in advocating for those making things better, effective, efficient and equitable or check out other stories of innovation on the $ Govlaunch podcast$ .

For more information on how to connect through open innovation events hosted by the Montgomery County innovation team visit $ https://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/innovation/$