In this episode of the Smart City Podcast I have a great conversation with Danielle Storey. Danielle is the Chief Innovation Officer of Smarter Technology Solutions, a specialist Smart City Consulting and System Integration Company working with some of the leading Smart Cities in Australia. It’s the third time she’s been on the podcast (previously in Episodes 25 and 35) and this time we talk about Smart City Governance and the importance of frameworks in this space. I hope you enjoy listening to this bonus episode as much as I enjoyed making it.

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What we covered in this episode:

• A bit about Danielle’s background and what she’s passionate about, for those who haven’t yet listened to Episode 35
• What a Smart City is to her and why it’s so important
• How Danielle thinks Australia is embracing the Smart City concept and our place in the global context
• The opportunities for global collaboration that exist in regions with similar problems   
• What is governance and the various elements of it
• The importance of having education and consultation in parallel and of asking the questions ‘what lens are we looking through?’ And ‘what problems are we solving?’
• Why we need to empower people to make decisions within organisations as well as external stakeholders
• The challenges with having a critical mass of interested parties, engaging people at all levels and having management/senior leadership buy in when incorporating Smart City strategies
• The need for representing a variety of people on committees as equals, and having a mix of technical and non-technical people in the room to make educated decisions
• The benefits of periodically getting away from business-as-usual to focus on innovation
• Emerging trends Danielle has come across since her last interview, including the building momentum for Smart Cities, the interest in public-private partnerships and the movements away from a risk-averse culture
• Some upcoming conferences and events in the Smart Space in Australia

Quotes:

“I think a Smart City is really about aspiring to do things better. And whether better is more sustainably, to better support the local economy, or whether it’s about the communities. It’s using data and technology to be more efficient and effective in how we run cities and deliver services to the community.”

“I don’t feel that we’re so far behind. Certainly some of the global case studies do a great job of marketing, but boots on the ground, what they’re delivering is not overly dissimilar to what we’re delivering here [in Australia], but perhaps they do it in a more mature way.”

“Depending on the person you’re talking to, [governance] might mean policy and procedure and auditing; to someone else that might mean vision and leadership and a documented strategy; for others it might be technical architecture frameworks and making sure that when we build all these things that they do fit together nicely and we can share data between organisations.”

“The governance piece is not just internal Council-led, but also should be in strong consultation with both those internal stakeholders and the external public.”

“Sometimes people don’t know what they want because they don’t understand the context of the  question. If people don’t know what Smart Cities is and what its capable of, then their suggestions are not going to be coming from a place that understands what is possible.”

“If you talk about Smart Cities and technology, it’s not surprise that you might lose 50% fo the audience in the opening lines. But if you ask people if they want to make their cities safer, create local jobs or fix the traffic problems, you rarely have someone who doesn’t want to participate.”

“We’re always too busy to take a step back and think about if there’s better ways of doing things. But just taking a step back, you often create sometimes a bit more work in the short term to make things more effective and efficient in the long term.”

“If this is something we’re serious about, and if we’re going to change the way that we deliver services and we’re going o change the way that we operate, then how are we going to get there and who do we need to come on the journey?”

“You need people to come along for the ride, and change is not easy. I think it’s probably a bigger challenge than the technology or the actual implementation of a  “Smart City” but it’s the important bit.”

“I’ve really noticed in the last 6 months things really accelerating [in the general awareness about the Smart City space]. I still think we’re probably 2 years away from the critical mass.”

Links:

WaterStart Nevada

IOT Impact Event in Sydney 10th 11th September by the IOTAA

Smart Cities Week Australia in October

ASCA Discussion Paper on Reimagining the Local Government Operation Model

Connect:

Connect with Dani on LinkedIn or Smarter Technology Solutions at the website http://smartertechnologysolutions.com.au

Connect with me via email: hello@mysmart.community

Connect with My Smart Community via LinkedIn or Twitter and watch on YouTube

Podcast Production by Perk Digital