Archives for Strategy - Page 3
Labour Leadership – Who to Choose?
Labour logo. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) I generally avoid politics because my job needs me to stay politically neutral. However the Labour leadership election isn't just politics, it's also about voter engagement. Unlike all the previous party leadership races I've watched, this labour leadership election is different. In the wake of their electoral defeat the Labour Party are trying to engage voters to choose the next Labour leadership team. This is a bold move, which hasn't been without its controversy. People have alleged that hard left groups have registered to vote, and others that Tories have done the same. Both allegations have been used to justify the support for Jeremy Corbyn. The former group are seen as true believers in socialism and the latter in an attempt to make Labour unelectable. Personally I doubt that either group can get enough support from the 610,000 eligible…
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Digital Transformation in Government
The purpose of government is to serve its citizens, it should do that as efficiently and effectively as possible. The extent to which any specific government serves its people should depend very much on the needs and wishes of those people. I very much doubt that many people in the UK would disagree with that statement. Almost everyone that I have ever worked with in the public sector holds the first sentence as a core belief. You cannot work effectively for long in public service if you don't. However we seem to have gone astray a little. I think that the reasons for this is rigidity of institutions, exacerbated by thirty years of ideology that the private sector is better than the public sector. The fad for outsourcing on long-term monopoly contracts stifles change. I've seen this first hand in more than one central…
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It’s the Economy Stupid
It never ceases to amaze me how bad a grasp politicians have on how national economies ; I think it is deliberate rather than ignorance. Or rather they think that we are too stupid to understand how a national economy differs from a household economy. They may even be correct about that Received wisdom on the economy (according to politics) - growth needs to be sustainable - the deficit should be reduced - austerity is necessary Most commonly our main political parties use a household analogy to explain their economic policies. This is a very wrong thing to do. It sort of ignores the interdependency of national economies, and it over simplifies things. That said it is something that most voters can relate to. A better, but still flawed, analogy would be a multi person multi income household. Imagine a…
A/B Testing Amazon book sales
A/B Testing is when you try two almost identical approaches out with real people to see which option gets the best response. The only difference between A & B is the thing that you are trying to test. In my trial I had the same science fiction novella available through two Amazon ASIN. Both were enrolled in KDP (there's nothing forbidding this but I'm sure Amazon don't encourage that behaviour). Crisis Point (UK - 2 reviews) Crisis Point (UK - 0 reviews) What was different between these two was that one of the versions has two reviews, both five stars. There are also changes to the wording in the blurb. The test So this wasn't quite true A/B Testing as I didn't perform the free days simultaneously, one was over the Christmas period and the other was last weekend. However…
Opinion Polling Accuracy
In September I did a series of factual posts on the opinion polls for the referendum. There is stuff we can learn from comparing the actual result to what the polls said beforehand. Especially as we have a General Election in a few months. It is also worth pointing out that my day job is politically restricted and so I can only offer factual analysis and need to avoid political partisanship. That said I may say positive or negative things about party positions, that shouldn't be construed as support for any party. Many political positions are not supported by relevant evidence but the public doesn't often know or listen to evidence and politicians that want to be elected must listen to the public. Many people, mainly pro-independence supporters, were surprised by the 55% no vote. The polls had narrowed in…