Background and Context
At the beginning of January I received a student contract to work at Shared Services Canada (SSC) on the Open Government team. Since then I have been helping them reach their deliverables through various tasks and initiatives that aim in promoting open government across the department. One of my larger projects right now is conducting research to help decide in SSC's updated implementation plan for open information. The research seeks to learn from the different practices and success factors of other departments and decide on SSC's best course of action.
With the research I was conducting at work I thought it would be a good idea to incorporate that as a possible research question for the course. When Ingenium gave a presentation earlier on in the semester they graciously gave a list of questions we might choose from and I selected the one that spoke closely to my line of work: How has the approach to managing information changed or
stayed the same since information has become open?
How has the approach to managing information changed or
stayed the same since information has become open?
I reached out to the manager of information at Ingenium about the research question and was told that what they were looking for was the change in open information in their department which could also help inform about Crown Corporations in general. I then did some preliminary research on Open Government, open information and its impact on Crown corporations but came up with no information, most likely due to the newness of open government being implemented across departments and corporations which led me to revise my approach to the question.
Research Question and objectives
With the advent of digital technology there is greater proliferation of information as well as extensive sharing of information. Due to the shift in culture in the sharing of information there has also been a shift in private and public organizations to change their informational culture to a more open one.
Due to the shift in culture in the sharing of information there has also been a shift in private and public organizations to change their informational culture to a more open one.
The Open Government initiative itself started back in 2009 where the then newly elected president, Barack Obama, called for a more transparent, open government. In 2011 an Open Government Partnership was created and since then 79 countries are participating to lead their government towards an open by default culture. Canada joined the partnership not long after its creation in 2011 and has since created three action plans and promoted open government throughout their departments. While studies have looked at how open information practices are being applied through different information fields, organizations and departments but there has not been any focus on how Crown corporations information management practices have been impacted by open information initiatives and whether that caused them to change their practices before open government.
I initially started my research with these questions:
RQ: What is the evolution of information management practices in an open information context within crown corporations from 2011 to 2020?
SQ1: What are the specific information practices affected by an open information culture?
SQ2: To what extent do practices at Crown Corporations alter form other environments?
I based my initial research on the government terms for open information and information management (IM) practices. After a more extensive search I realized that due to the relative newness of open government there was little to no information on IM practices before and after Open government in the open information context. Conversely, I found more information on open data since the Canadian government initiative focused on that aspect of open government quite heavily in the past years. I have then decided to redirect some of my research to look at maybe being able to assess or predict the change based on existing literature on open data. I then reframed my sub-question to: what can we learn from open data that can inform open information and the previous IM practices?
With this redirected question in mind the research will attempt to answer through a study controlling for previous and current information management practices from information professionals at the Ingenium centre. This research will seek to answer the current gap in knowledge or research on the effect open government has had on IM practices not only on crown corporations but also eventually on other departments and private organizations.
Lit. Review
My initial literature review sought to define first open information. According to Treasury Board Secretariat (TBS) Open information is: “[u]nstructured information that is freely shared without restrictions.” (Treasury Board Secretariat of Canada, 2019, para.11).
Other sources also concur on the meaning of open information especially since the Open Government initiative where it was differentiated between data(raw, unfiltered information) and information(structured information) and is now being made accessible to all users (Roy, 2017; Harrison, 2012)
I also searched current information practices in an open information context. In the early years, and still today, information management practices are conducted in a closed by default fashion as Clarke (2019) noted in her book Opening the Government of Canada that the open data initiative that had been started as part of the open government initiative uncovered messy IM practices with “ad hoc approaches to IM management” and concluding that poor IM practices “is not only a driver of closed government but also a symptom of closed government” (Clarke, 2019, p. 117).
the open data initiative that had been started as part of the open government initiative uncovered messy IM practices with “ad hoc approaches to IM management” and concluding that poor IM practices “is not only a driver of closed government but also a symptom of closed government” (Clarke, 2019, p. 117).
Practices were then reconstructed and realigned to meet the goal of creating an open-by-default initiative. Where at first information was conducted in a classical input, processing activities and output, now because of open government and the interchange of information between departments there are evolutions of the types of information being shared such as when creating new services they are not only looking at current information processes being used but what can innovate their current internal or external services (Heijlen et al., 2018,p.11.). Departments such as Industry Canada have sought to refine their information management practices by converting their multiple network drives to shared drives such as their Business-based Classification Structure (BCS) which is a business and functions-based classification structure seeking to improve information management practices regardless of information repository types due to its function rather than subject-based structure (Park &Neal, 2012, p. 23). Similarly, case studies were conducted in Australia on the change that their new information Act has helped in the cause of open, transparent and accountable government by making the release of information more proactive and change from “information on demand” to “information on tap” through their e-tendering service, Tenderlink (Furnas, 2016, para. 6). Structures like this are some of the different information management initiatives that countries are trying to implement to improve the management of information within a digital world and the open government initiative and through case studies inform for the next step in advancing towards an open by default culture.
Currently there is no research on the before and after OG initiative of information management in Crown Corporations. Since this initiative is quite recent (since 2011) many of the departments have been focusing on open data rather than open information (actually really depends on departments focus).
The research I have found so far on Open data has shown that other countries and their governments have based their successes on case studies that were done on collaborating with the public and that following the OG transparency directive really helps in defining the digital IM practices that are required for an Open government. (Shared Services Canada, 2016; Luna-Reyes & Najafabadi, 2019)
I then decided to redefine open information for this research to mean information of both structured and unstructured content (so both data and information). This will be easier in framing my research and seeking to perhaps inform about IM practices through open data implementation.
Methodology
For the methodology I am not quite sure yet how to conduct it so I will put down both a qualitative and quantitative approach and you can tell me which one (or both) would be most appropriate for this particular study.
Qualitative: If this was a qualitative study I would use a Grounded theory approach since the topic is relatively new and there is no previous predictors to indicate the best method to approach. This way we can form the theory as the research evolves.
This would be a purposeful sampling (case study) at the Ingenium centre where I would either conduct a focus group or individual interviews. The advantage of focus groups is that it would take less time to collect data. Individual interviews are advantageous in that there is no potential influence of opinion from others.
The participants would consist of information management employees. The reason is that they have personnel working there from over 5+ years ago which means that a necessary qualitative case study would have to be conducted from Ingenium with selective participants.
Characteristics of the population: IM employees at Ingenium who have worked there for over 5 years.
Since this is a defined group maybe get employees awareness and participation through the IM manager.
The interviews/focus group would have to focus on IM practices that were used before and after OG implementation.
The data collected from these interviews would then give an indication of practices during a closed government and perhaps concur with (Clarke, 2019) who said that IM practices were messy before open government.
Quantitative: Conduct a survey to establish for information practices that exist now as a result of open government.
Purpose of survey
The primary purpose of this study is to empirically evaluate whether information practices have changed with the advent of Open Government (OG)specifically within the Crown Corporations. This will be done by conducting a survey with IM employees who have been working at Ingenium for over 5 years. The survey can be conducted in French and English.
Sampling: single-stage convenience sample.
Instrumentation: I will define information management as the independent variable and open information as the dependent variable. As mentioned previously, for this research open information is defined as both open data and open information (structured and unstructured content). Would the right type of statistical test be a Chi-Squared Test since it is an association between tow variables measured by categories (would categories be before and after OG)?
Time-aspect:The survey will be longitudinal over a period of three months(Preferrably before or after summer months to better capture targeted employee participation)
Rationale and form of data collection
An initial survey will be emailed to all IM employees and will describe research as well as ask screening questions to target specific employees that fit the requirements at the beginning of week. Once selected participants will be notified and receive another survey via email with semi-structured questions to direct their responses.
Besides in person interviews or focus group, e-mail seems to be the most efficient way of reaching all employees during their work day since they would all have access to a computer.