July, month of Innovation

July is synonymous with innovation for Public Administration (AP). It all started in July 2018, when the Innovation AP started a set of initiatives to bring the Incentive System for Innovation in Public Management (SIIGeP) to the entire AP. And for the third consecutive year, in July, we celebrated the month of innovation, which aims to activate participation, simplification and innovation in Public Administration.

The month of July represents the beginning of the entry into force of the SIIGeP, established by Ordinance No. 186/2018, of June 27, and, in 2021, the celebration of one year after the publication of the Strategy for Innovation and Modernization of the State and Public Administration 2020 -2023, published in the Resolution of the Council of Ministers No. 55/2020, 31 July.

To mark the importance and growth of the innovation ecosystem in PA, this year we declined the word innovation with two other strong words: participation and simplification. This is the trilogy of administrative modernization, supported by the digital, but conceived and implemented by people. A transforming energy that produces results, within the PA and in its relationship with the society it serves.

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Events

Sign up:

9th July	16h – 17h30 CET	|	|	Participate to Innovate: What spaces are we building? [event language: PT]
16th July	16h – 17h30 CET	|	|	Simplification: Innovation with an impact on people’s lives [PT]
21st July	12h – 13h30 CET	|	|	A global look at Innovation in the Public Sector [EN]
30 July	11h – 12h00 CET	|	|	One year of Innovation and Modernization Strategy [coming soon]

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Agenda:

Participate to Innovate: What spaces are we building?

Participation is one of the main drivers of innovation. Involving workers and citizens in a broad and inclusive participatory ecosystem allows us to identify issues to be resolved, design the best approaches, test responses, act faster, reach everyone. Participation opens up space to think and do differently, to generate confidence, to reinforce the capacity for achievement. Therefore, developing participation in all its forms, through different instruments and tools, in systems suited to each organizational and cultural context, is essential to foster innovation. It is, therefore, necessary to understand how we can stimulate participation and make it more dynamic in a systematic way in public management.

Bureaucracy is the main target of simplification. Innovation is the main way to find new solutions to eliminate useless procedures and to simplify necessary procedures. Understanding the tension between bureaucracy and innovation is essential to understanding the importance of the simplification challenge. In Portugal, the SIMPLEX program has been, over the last few years, one of the most effective tools of innovation policy in public administration. To understand innovation, it is necessary to understand what we have learned from this program that is the flagship of administrative modernization and to discuss the vision for administrative simplification in the future.

A global look at Innovation in the Public Sector (event language: English)

Innovation in public administration stems from the need to adapt the traditional role of public structures and services to the emerging needs of society. Openness, transparency, simplification, participation and the new designs of solutions and of the public entities themselves are the main aspects touched by innovation. Digital technologies open up new possibilities, but it is also necessary to develop new skills, lead in another way and create environments conducive to imagination, new ideas and experimentation. All over the world, innovation in Public Administration is discussed and takes place in the most diverse forms and circumstances. Being aware of this global challenge is an important part of the mobilization to increase the capacity to innovate.