Reading List Picks of 2024
Every year I put together one of these lists…well, except last year when I had a break. But I’m getting back in the habit and sharing these pieces I read that gave me ideas, crystallised my thinking or changed my mind.
Product management
4 Tips for a Strong Marketplace Strategy
My first thought about the Planning Data platform was ‘This is a marketplace’. Marketplaces have cold-start problems: you need a good balance of exchange between supply and demand, but when you start off you may have neither. We started on the supply-side problem because although competitors exist, they don’t have the same competitive advantage as us. So this piece was helpful in laying out all the other factors of a marketplace strategy.
Read 4 Tips for a Strong Marketplace Strategy, 10 mins
UI=f(org): UI is a Function of Your Organisation
This piece does a nice job of explaining how interface design can have a direct impact on your organisation’s success, using the Domino’s pizza tracker as an example. It’s a good piece to turn to should you ever need to explain to a non-digital leader why user-centred design is important.
Read UI=f(org): UI is a Function of Your Organisation, 4 mins
Want OKRs to succeed? Start with why
The first thing I had to do joining the Planning Data platform this year was establish an OKR framework, linking the work teams do to our strategy and roadmap. While some people on the team had used OKRs before, others hadn’t, so I felt like I should describe why we use them. This piece was really helpful in framing that.
Read Want OKRs to succeed? Start with why, 5 mins
Finding the Intersection Between Market Research & User Research
A cogent, well structured article on how market research can complement user research. The history of product management includes product marketing, and private-sector product managers are no strangers to analysing a market or competitors. These techniques are still valuable in the public sector, in my view, as they help you get a wider understanding of users’ problems and needs. (Plus, loads of private services are springing up where public services are failing, like driving tests, so competition may be a useful framing.)
Read Finding the Intersection Between Market Research & User Research, 8 mins
Graphing team communication patterns
Back in 2021, Xander wanted to find out who spoke to who on our GOV.UK Pay teams. It was dead handy. We found out that one developer was asked tons of questions on Slack, and because he’s a nice guy he answered them. This took him away from sprint work – which explained why we hadn’t been hitting our sprint goals. This insight forced us to improve documentation and how we share knowledge across teams. It made us more resilient and increased delivery speed.
Read Graphing team communication patterns, 7 mins
Team memory, organisational sharing and serendipity in distributed workplaces and the role of Transactive Memory Systems in great teams
Continuing the subject of team knowledge and memory, Emily wrote two fantastic pieces on how knowledge moves about teams in a hybrid work environment. I think about this loads. Learning is less ephemeral now we’re hybrid, so knowledge needs to be written down. She has tips on creating moments of serendipity too.
Read Team memory, organisational sharing and serendipity in distributed workplaces, 7 mins, and The role of Transactive Memory Systems in great teams, 5 mins
Nice Managers Force Priorities
Over the last couple of years, I’ve been thinking lots about bottom-up versus top-down. Ideally you want a nice blend of both. But there are moments when forcing priorities can be handy, adding hard constraints that focus action. I’ve certainly been on teams when management didn’t do any prioritisation and you don’t know which turns to take. Forcing priorities can help.
Read Nice Managers Force Priorities, 7 mins
Shuhari for product managers
While there’s heaps of frameworks and templates you can follow as a product person, developing product sense is the best way to learn: and that means doing something over and over and over again to learn it well. That’s the basis of Roger’s piece on shuhari for product managers, a concept from Japanese martial arts.
Read Shuhari for product managers, 5 mins
A plea for Product craft: shout about your ‘negative space’
Tom always reminds me about the things I’m forgetting to do as a product person, including talking about the options we didn’t pursue (and why). The main currency of a product team is risk: working out what to do and what not do in terms of value, viability, usability and feasibility. That means reminding your leaders that the path to a working product is all the things we didn’t build along the way.
Read A plea for Product craft: shout about your ‘negative space’, 6 mins
Poking holes in reality with prototypes
Ever since we visited them in 2019, I’ve been super jealous of the BBC R&D team. This post by Libby Miller explains the exciting prototyping she’s done over the years to explore new concepts and what people think about them. A good reminder that starting with tangible, physical objects can bring out other options. Not everything needs to be clickable!
Read Poking holes in reality with prototypes, 15 mins
Blame culture isn’t what I used to think it is
A neat reframing of blame culture from Roger. There’s little psychological safety where a blame culture exists, which reduces people’s ability to take risks or innovate. Taking responsibility for your actions is different to explaining them, and because we work in teams it’s rarely one person’s fault. A good piece on rethinking culture in your teams.
Read Blame culture isn’t what I used to think it is, 3 mins
Becoming more strategic, navigating difficult colleagues, harnessing founder mode, and more
I rarely engage with Lenny’s Newsletter, but this bit from Anneka Gupta really struck a chord with me this year. The word ‘strategic’ is in my job title and she nails how to think about it.
Read Becoming more strategic, navigating difficult colleagues, harnessing founder mode, and more (or listen to the podcast), 50 mins
Digital government
Automation and the Jevons paradox
A great piece from Tim, pointing to how we could use extra capacity from automation to add value rather than simply reduce costs. Instead of automating government services to cut jobs and save money, we could reinvest that extra capacity into improving the quality of services.
Read Automation and the Jevons paradox, 6 mins
Designing new public institutions for the UK in the 2020s and beyond
The new capabilities created by the state will undoubtedly need new institutions to govern things. This piece from a professor at UCL shows how we already know how to create new institutions, using the principles and wiring of digital organisations.
Read Designing new public institutions for the UK in the 2020s and beyond, 8 mins
What does the internet want from a new Digital Centre for the UK Government?
Cracking round-up from Tim on what everyone said they wanted from a new digital centre of government. It’s quite a long wishlist and it’ll be interesting to see what actually gets implemented.
Read What does the internet want from a new Digital Centre for the UK Government?, 7 mins
Feedback is about change
Sarah Gold writes about utilising feedback to create change, and how that can build more trustworthy relationships between people and organisations. A good reminder that we should act on feedback rather than just simply collecting it.
Read Feedback is about change, 5 mins
The National Data Library should help people deliver trustworthy data services
Peter wrote this paper on avoiding a tech-first approach with the National Data Library, instead thinking about developing skills and capabilities first. I contributed some thinking and links to the piece because it’s a subject I’m close to.
Read The National Data Library should help people deliver trustworthy data services, 9 mins
Artificial intelligence
AI as Algorithmic Thatcherism
This isn’t dissimilar to Tim’s piece about automation and Jevons paradox. But also highlights the very physical costs of a seemingly limitless technology: energy, chips, water, human labour. It’s good to keep reminding ourselves of the otherwise invisible parts of the AI value chain.
Read AI as Algorithmic Thatcherism, 4 mins
AI Makes Tech Debt More Expensive
A good piece highlighting how generative AI is unlikely to magic away all the legacy tech at the heart of public services. Some times you’ve just got to do the hard engineering work before anything can get better.
Read AI Makes Tech Debt More Expensive, 4 mins
It’s your fault if it doesn’t work
Terrific run-down of the rhetoric of AI companies, from Tobias. It is fascinating to watch this hype cycle play out amongst normal, non-technical people. The way this technology is sold to us undoubtedly has a part to play.
Read It’s your fault if it doesn’t work, 8 mins
The meaning of “AI”
Handy reminder from Jeremy that people love talking about magic and will sprinkle magical categories onto otherwise mundane things. It has been helpful to refer to AI as ‘applied statistics’, so a big thank-you to him for this post.
Read The meaning of “AI”, 6 mins
Statement from Economists on the Importance of Open Source AI
One from my personal scrapbook on the economic benefits of open source. This one is pretty fresh but points to the positive benefits of open-sourced ecosystems.
Read Statement from Economists on the Importance of Open Source AI, 5 mins
FOMO is not a strategy
Also available as a sticker, Rachel Coldicutt reminds us of the very real, unavoidable limits of AI and its prophesied revolution of the universe: people. It’s good for some things, not so great for others, and you can’t redesign working practices overnight. Things take time. So it’s worth dialling down the FOMO.
Read FOMO is not a strategy, 6 mins
Placemaking
Modern Housing: an environmental common good
Are we building homes or mortgages? A good reminder that economic growth is a secondary benefit from building homes and there are other goals to aim for.
Read Modern Housing: an environmental common good, 1 hour
Why Did Our Homes Stop Evolving?
An interview with Emanuele Coccia, who argues that domesticity is an overlooked ingredient in placemaking and architecture. Our modern lives have been transformed but we’re still living in homes based on 17th-century designs. (All those people on Homes Under the Hammer turning houses into HMOs, do they consider living space at all?!) A fresh perspective on the places that make up larger places.
Read Why Did Our Homes Stop Evolving?, 8 mins
Why is Croydon shaped the way it is today?
Cool piece on the history of Croydon and how it came to be the way it is today. Helped me find out that people who once owned our garden also owned a pub near West Croydon station.
Read Why is Croydon shaped the way it is today?, 4 mins
How we store data from local planning authorities and keep it up to date
Greg, a data analyst on our Data Management team, wrote about the data model at the heart of our planning data platform. I’ve included this because it’s clear, simple and easy to follow – which is rare for posts about data models. This has become one of our onboarding documents for new team members. It’s great!
Read How we store data from local planning authorities and keep it up to date, 8 mins
Sometimes, Democratic Design Doesn’t “Look” Like Anything
A piece on Dwight H. Perkins, an architect in early 1900s Chicago who saw the city through the lens of social needs and demographics, not aesthetic form. He believed schools could improve public health and unite diverse neighborhoods. An eye-opener for me!
Read Sometimes, Democratic Design Doesn’t “Look” Like Anything, 10 mins
Other good bits
If we think it is a game, then it becomes a game – Mark on flux and Michael Mann’s Heat.
It’s squeaky.bum.time for what3words – from the ever-hilarious FT Alphaville.
UCL demographer’s work debunking ‘Blue Zone’ regions of exceptional lifespans wins Ig Nobel prize – hilarious study showing that cultures with a high proportion of centenarians also have a lot of tax fraud!
Canteenlessness – the sad state of lunch at work, and an ode to canteens.
Check out my reading lists from 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022