Human Resources

The U.K. government has announced US$26 million funding to boost mobile working by children's social workers. The money from the Department for Education and Skills is aimed at helping employers invest in mobile devices, laptops and PDAs.

In Gatineau, Que., citizens can stay connected to city government with an inside view of Council from the comfort of their couch. In Part 1 of InterGovWorld's Spotlight on Marc Bureau, the Mayor of Gatineau discusses the many reasons why his city has been short-listed as one of the world's most "intelligent communities."

Database problems at the Bacs clearing system have left up to 400,000 people awaiting their salary payments. Bacs provides a central clearing house for automated payments and clears 30 million a day. It is one of the largest automated payment systems in the world, processing more than 20 million salaries a month, 70 per cent of U.K. household bills and the majority of state benefits and pension payments.

Companies shouldn't wait for government or customers to prod them to develop privacy policies says Michelle Dennedy, CPO of Sun Microsystems Inc

In Part 1 of InterGovWorld's Spotlight on Donna Achimov of Service Canada, we discussed read-to-me access to information and how a degree in journalism kickstarted a degree in public sector management. In Part 2, we look at how focus-testing can finetune services for citizens, how Service Canada employees stay connected even when they're way up North, and how being a "techie" can help if you want to work in the public sector.

Access to human resources information can now be gained 24/7 by workers with the Calgary Health Region. The information is being delivered via automated self-service kiosks developed by systems integrator IBM Canada Ltd.

Cheap or free registration of new domain names drives the growth in Web sites used for spamming or hosting malicious software, according to research from McAfee.

Late last century, it became apparent that when government empowered its citizens, government empowered itself. What prevailed was a widespread acknowledgement that people knew more than governments did about what people wanted or needed. Citizens in the early 21st century want government to serve them as sensitively and efficiently as their bank, retail service provider or their car dealership.