Open policy making involves greater collaboration between civil servants and outside experts to improve policy quality. It requires an open mindset and tools to gather diverse viewpoints and evidence to develop innovative, tested solutions. While open approaches like crowdsourcing and co-production allow more ambition, policies still must fit an organization's constraints. The goal is to apply an open mindset and test opportunities to involve the public more in evidence gathering and policy development.

1. Open Policy Making
Paul Maltby
Director, Government Innovation Group
Cabinet Office

2. 2
Good policy making = open policy making?
Open Policy Making…
Our central contention is that the best way to drive up the quality of Civil Service
policy advice over time is to open it up – to encourage much greater collaboration
between civil service experts and those outside the service to ensure that the best
innovative thinking is understood and that conventional internal thinking is challenged.
Sir Jeremy Heywood

3. Open Policy Making involves a shift in mindset plus
tools to draw in new viewpoints, evidence and ways of
implementing
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Collab
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Open
Policy
Making
Challe
nging
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Tran
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Com rsever
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Flexib
le
3
Engaging
the full
range of
views
• Consultation with
experts
• User journeys
• Social media
• Multidisciplinary teams
• Coproduction
• Crowdsourcing
Gathering
new
insights
Testing
solutions
in the real
world
• Behavioural Insights
• Horizon scanning
• Systems thinking
• Mystery shopping
• Data science
• Scenario modelling
• Prototyping and testing
• Randomised controlled
trials
• What works

4. 4
Open Policy has to be done within the constraints of
your subject and Department
Crowdsourcing
High
Collaborative policy making
Persona testing
Coproduction
Ambition
Developing policy with users at the heart
Scenario testing
Insight tools
Call for challenge
Multidisciplinary team
Testing
Public
experience map
Stakeholder map
Multidisciplinary reference
group
Informed policy making
Public engagement
Expert engagement
Consultation
Low
Evidence
gathering
Open Policy Making mindset
Constrained
Permission
Opportunities to experiment