Week 40: urgency is uncomfortable
I’m working with GovTech Barbados, helping build team capability at speed by delivering alpha.gov.bb.
This week went like this:
- Show and tell #2
- How to go quicker, sustainably
- Interviewing service designers
Show and tell #2
This was our second show and tell, and this time the GovTech team did most of the talking, which is exactly what we want.
Last time, it felt like Public Digital carried most of the weight. That’s not what this is about.
The team presented on visual regression testing (catching visual bugs and broken links early), shared how we shipped our first form and how we’ll gather and assess feedback, and talked through how we’re improving security with automated code and vulnerability scanning.
I spoke briefly about how we prioritise work, and Mark, the CEO of GovTech, talked about finding better words than “alpha” and our plan to make alpha.gov.bb more available to the general public by the end of the next sprint.
How to go quicker, sustainably
I’ve been thinking a lot about how to help the team move faster in a sustainable way. Mostly, that’s meant being clearer about our priorities:
- ship 20 entry points (start pages)
- migrate content from gov.bb
- start collecting feedback
- begin digitising forms
- deliver a “deep” transformation
The side effect is that I’ve felt like I’ve been shorter with people, even brash, cutting conversations off early and worrying that I’m upsetting people. The truth is, time is against us, and urgency is uncomfortable but necessary.
That’s an uncomfortable place for me. People need time and space to explore, and that’s how good teams form and grow. But sometimes progress means making decisions quickly and moving forward, even if it feels abrupt.
Interviewing service designers
The whole team is looking for Bajans to join us as associates. This week I had three lovely conversations with people who applied for the service designer roles.
Service design is still a new term in Barbados, but the mindset is there. Everyone I spoke to wanted to make systemic change to “Bim” (what the locals call Barbados). And they all said, in different ways:
“This is about making things easier for people.”
That’s exactly the point.
Everything else
The rest of the week was general plate-spinning. It flew by, and honestly, I’m still piecing together where the hours went.
Last Sunday’s race
I held a steady pace for the first 20ish km, about 250th out of 500. It was pure fun: a long downhill through the forest on tight trails in the dark, everyone speeding up, lots of whooping and hollering, jumping tree roots and rocks and the occasional overtake. It felt like flying.
Then came the price. I walked most of the downhills in the final 30 km thanks to IT band issues. I finished in 12.5 hours, narrowly making the second-to-last cutoff by a few minutes. I decided a few minutes of painful running was better than the embarrassment of a DNF. And there’s no magic way to get down a mountain. Even if you quit you still have to walk down.