Unlocking digital innovation: the power of Open Working

In our previous blog, we discussed the state of digital skills in our sector and this time we will explore the mindset and practice of 'open working', also called working in the open, and how it can promote innovation and build digital skills in our sector.

I have always liked this quote by visionary Jimmy Wales, founder of Wikipedia: "Imagine a world where every single person on the planet has free access to the sum total of all human knowledge. That's what we're doing."

We all know and love Wikipedia, so much so that it's the fifth most visited website in the world, just behind Google, YouTube, Facebook and Twitter.

But Wikipedia is fundamentally different - it is not only a great example, but a global example of how open working can facilitate collaboration, knowledge-sharing and community-driven content creation and moderation.

What is open working?

Put simply, it is sharing the work you are doing as you’re doing it.

This is integrated already in many organisations, but is even better if it's shared with external stakeholders too, so others can learn and contribute to the work we do.

For a digital product or service, open working can mean sharing a product brief, a roadmap, or even just an update on progress.

Big tech companies, like Amazon, use practices like this internally. For example, by writing a mock product press release or frequently asked questions to help engage internal staff, and to collect feedback on an idea before diving into development.
 

Benefits of open working

In today's fast-paced digital world, open working is becoming an increasingly popular way to promote innovation and build digital skills with lots of benefits. Open working can:

• increase engagement with communities we want to reach, creating a link between the actions and the mission and soul of our organisations
• create faster innovation, with ideas coming from inside and outside the organisation, thereby harnessing early-stage input and building on existing learning. It’s a handy way to also spot duplication and avoid repeating other people’s mistakes.
• promote greater collaboration, as we can all see what is in development and where work connects. This can help us work towards our goals in unison, like with the shared vision of Uniting the Movement.

And on a personal level, it can also:

• build greater trust with the communities we are working with. It is a genuine step towards the sentiment in the disability rights slogan “nothing about us, without us”.
• be authentic by sharing the passion in our work and listening to others, people can understand we care and help us channel our energy into the right solutions.

Open working in practice

The idea of open working sounds simple enough, but it can feel hard to know where to start. Some of my personal favourites for overcoming the feared open-writers block are:

• weeknotes: quick summaries of what has been done and learnt in a week. These are shared by our partners and staff via email or internal blog posts.
• show-and-tell sessions: open-invite events where a team presents on recent progress and helps show the work via a live demo.
• posting updates all together: collectively posting short updates can help carve out the space and time to do it. We recently trialled this at a partner event and it helped to provide a snapshot and connect people around similar work.
• blogs and vlogs: writing up or recording sessions can create valuable and open resources. The Innovation and Digital Accelerator, Digital Marketing Hub and OpenActive, routinely shares all the sessions they host as standard.
• service recipes: a novel way of showing how a digital solution was built by showing the ingredients and steps in the building process. It’s a type of open working we are keen to explore more and currently Street Soccer Scotland is leading the charge for the sector.

In short, open working is gaining popularity and we believe it can help our sector promote innovation and build the digital skills it needs.

We can use open working to foster greater collaboration and engagement with the communities we are trying to reach.

In doing so, breaking down traditional barriers and promoting knowledge-sharing and transparency.

As the sector continues to evolve and face new challenges, open working will undoubtedly play an increasingly important role in driving innovation.

Please let us know if you are practicing open working or you can tag us on Twitter. We’re also on LinkedIn, as well as on Instagram and you can find us on Facebook too. If you want to start trying it, check out the resources below.”

Useful resources on open working

For those keen to learning more about open working, here are some resources I have found useful:

• Blog: What is working in the open for charities?
• Blog: What does “working in the open” mean?
• Open working toolkit
• Email learning course: What We Talk About When We Talk About Open