…Having good skills you can successfully do at many more jobs while making less mistakes doing it.[...]…

It’s just that some of the topics covered at the first meeting… well they cover areas that, really, the members of the group should really know a lot about already.

If you have enough interest to join a group as such as this then I would have thought/hoped that perhaps you should, for example, already know what to look for in CMS.

The discussion panels are a good idea. (Though I get the feeling that the Perfect Council Website one may as well be called How Long is the Perfect Piece of String!)

Personally I’d like to see some more focus on the practical design and code elements – but I think that’s where the management angle comes in and moves away from that side of the job.

I’d personally find presentations and discussions about accessibility techniques, design techniques, grid layouts, web typography, semantics, HTML 5, CSS 3, WCAG 2 etc. much more useful – and that’s not really management.

That’s practical getting the job done stuff.

That is why I find the Management tag off putting – and, for that matter, why I mentioned the similarities to the PSF events I have been to.

It’s perhaps not a problem of the group itself, it’s just that I just don’t feel it’s being aimed at me – as someone who actually does the coding and design of sites.

There are lots of really good conferences and events out there that already deal for that side of things… but not from a local government angle.

As for the voices thing… well, yeah, I’m as guilty as anyone. I’ve checked back at the forum a lot but haven’t really had anything to say on any of the subjects! I promise I will try…

my opinion is that it can’t be just ‘managers’ – for one thing this would currently exclude me as my title says ‘officer’! It also can’t be just webbies because that would exclude our head, our ‘web manager’, which I wouldn’t want to see, even though he’s not a ‘webbie’. the core has to be webbies though, web-people, and as Jack points out, this could be people who’s not got Manager in their title.

Ian is totally right though about participation, it won’t happen without it.

I’ve also posted elsewhere that it should be open to commercial people but only by invitation of a member – for one thing, if the commercial person uses the opportunity to sell, sell, sell then we can take it out on the inviter ;]

paul

Jack, what do you think?

If the group is called the Public Sector Web Management Group, then that indicates to me that it should be open to anyone who’s involved with the management of websites, rather than the management of web teams. That opens it to techies, PR people and independent experts as well as Web department managers.

(I’m also posting this at PSWMG, btw)

One thing is for sure – unless people are prepared actually to DO something where this Group is concerned rather than waiting to be spoon-fed and just looking on chances are it will go nowhere.

Paul

I like the idea of this group, but I don’t like the manager tag either. Especially as most of the web related managers I have met over the years tend to be the last people I would want to see in charge of governing any sort of body related to the future of Local Authority web development. (Present job excluded of course!)

However looking at the agenda for the first meeting I can see why the manager tag is there…

:: Choosing a suitable CMS
:: Panel / Floor Discussion – ‘What is the perfect council website?’
:: The local authority webteam and standards
:: Intranets in Local Government – The Future? (do we actually need them?)

Well… it’s not very technical is it? In fact, the sucking of eggs comes to mind.

Also scanning through the forum it’s already becoming apparent that we have the same few well recognised BIG voices coming out over everyone else. Some voices I’m more comfortable with than others.

Oh and the PublicSectorForums involvement also means that the events do bear a massive resemblance to every other PublicSectorForum event… not always a bad thing (that’s were I first encountered your good self after all…), but it would be nice to get a different view that was obviously seperate.

Maybe even with less focus on the Local Gov aspect, and more on the real world.

I’m rambling now but, basically, though my interest has been piqued but I don’t think this is going to be for me.

The clue was in the title really.