Martha Edwards

A 'fun' / challenging game to play in government is "try to find this person on the org chart"

Are they in this vaguely-named division or that one? (NEITHER)

Ooo this branch has all the right keywords...maybe there? (NOPE)

Which of these 35 'strategy' teams are they be part of? (NONE OF THEM)

Monthnote: July 2025 July started slowly for me: recovering from illness, travelling with my kids, bringing home a new puppy wore... it all wore me out. But work kept chugging along at its usual pace. No summer slowdown h...

July monthnote up ft:
- Recent work (internal project + usability testing)
- Writing some things
- Spending perhaps too much time on non-design-specific tasks to make the design happen
- taking connection opportunities wherever I can find them

www.marthaedwards.ca/monthnote-ju...

Inclusive Design 24 (#id24) A free 24-hour online community event on accessibility and inclusion

The full schedule of ‪‪@inclusivedesign24.bsky.social‬ is online, and it's going to be an amazing 24 hours for anyone interested in accessibility. For those not familiar, it's 24 hours, free conferences on accessibility, available on YouTube. Save the date: 25 September 2025!

This is a great point. I do like having a seat assignment, so I think I will book the route I actually plan on taking. Thank you!

It's september (for SD in Gov) so I think I will miss it, but I'm pretty risk averse in general so I might just book properly and get the seat I want

Thank you for this info! Really helpful, and looking forward to seeing you in Edinburgh again 🙂

London KX to Edinburgh!

In other words, is there a chance the other trains in my time window (11 and 11:30) could be full and I would be out of luck?

Rail question for UK folk:

Let's say I'm booking a semi-flexible one-way, meaning I can travel on any of the same train within a 70 min window

Best train for me is 11am but 10:30 is cheaper. Is it irresponsible to book the 10:30 semi-flexible with the intention of taking the 11?

Ohhhh this is a great idea, and I love the framing of rewarding positive behaviours rather than focusing on negative ones (which perhaps I do too much.)

Totally agree. It's challenging doing this where I am now because mapping and open working are afterthoughts / 'nice to haves' / side of desk / grass roots efforts .... and the maintenance is usually outsourced to private industry 🫠

This is true in 🇨🇦 & working in the open is one of our digital principles.

But I've often encountered this as an individual mindset, a sense of 'if you use what I've done, it's taking from me' (maybe a knock on effect of being close to 🇺🇸?)

I wonder what could help change this

So many 'private sector' mindsets have been adopted in gov that go against our core principles.

EG the idea of 'proprietary' work- People 'protecting' work from being copied & shared. It wastes $ & leads to inefficiency & duplication

How can we move from 'it's mine' to 'everything is co-owned'?

What's next:
- Validation workshop and continuing interviews
- More visioning and futures work
- Collaboration on an exciting facilitation opportunity in my newly re-orged division
- hopefully remembering to do these next week!

Was challenging:
- I'm running into some gatekeeping and silos that are hard to manage
- I've (once again) spent a large amount of time trying to track down previous relevant research that I know exists. Finally have a lead on this but the real question is: why is it so hard in the first place?

Went well:
- Delivering on lots of stuff, feeling v motivated
- Working with a team I've not connected with before who are lovely & excited for work
- Having higher leadership engaged in work & supporting when needed (surprisingly rare?)
- enjoyed doing UX testing as I don't do this much these days

Human-centred design 101 – Province of British Columbia Learn how the B.C. government used human-centred design to support people living in the province.

- had some guidance I wrote published on official channels digital.gov.bc.ca/design/hcd/i...
- participated in a great discussion on measuring services with folks from AB Gov and CDS
- and like most weeks had a bunch of touchpoints with different people on various things

Short-form weeknotes 21-25 July

What happened
- Working on internal service design review atm: team interviews + built out a blueprint, glossary, team guide and list of all tech and touchpoints (whew)
- helped a colleague by running a few UX testing sessions on a big public-facing service

Monthnote: June 2025 This is a few days late because my youngest and I were struck down with a nasty stomach flu last week and I still haven't bounced back completely. Anyway, here's what's been happening in my world lat...

June weeknotes are now live, ft

🚀 Thinking about the future (and activities that help do this) 🚀
✨ Proof that working in the open really works!
🫠 Another re-org in my division
😴 taking a break from design community
👯 much extroverting
🐶 and a new family member

www.marthaedwards.ca/june-monthno...

In the past month, I've learned that 2 of the houses I walk by *daily* on my way to the kids' school belong to people I know through work.

Feels like some kind of metaphor for how disconnected we are from our neighbours even though we are connected online

(or maybe just coincidence + small city)

@davidebybc.bsky.social appreciate your urgent attention on this before its too late for this sweet child. There are many outstanding questions the Health Minister hasn't answered yet (including what role her actual healthcare team played in the decision)

Last week I shared a workshop activity that I was planning (headlines of the future) at our x-gov design crit.

That activity has already been used twice in one week by designers who got the idea from my share.

In case you needed a reminder to share what you are working on 🙂

Absolutely gutted by this heartbreaking decision. Charleigh goes to school with my own 9yo and she's such a joyful presence in the school community 💔

I hope @timescolonist.bsky.social & other media are giving this decision the scrutiny and attention it deserves

Thank you for this ☺️ also very much relate to tabs of shame, I also have things I've been meaning to read for ages.

I’m pretty open about my ND. But while disclosing isn’t going to affect my current position, it could and likely has affected my odds at a promotion

I get stuck in thinking, “when I’m at x level I’ll be a more visible role model” … but where does that stop? There’s always another step up

a 2 by 2 matrix on service delivery culture in government which compares teams that are empowered versus controlled, with organizations that have high central support or low central support. Control + low support = inadequate, slow service delivery. Empowerment + low support = chaotic, fast delivery. Control + high support = inflexible, slow delivery. Empowerment + high support = responsive, fast delivery.

Here's something I've been noodling over as I reflect on the delivery cultures in the gov orgs I've worked for. Before I obsess any further ....

1 - I feel like someone must have done something similar before. Does this ring any bells for anyone?!

2 - any thoughts? does this resonate?

Ah thank you, I didn’t realize this was a thing!

I guess in government they would frown on this so it makes sense that we never looked at it as an option 🤣🤣

Interesting user research recruitment method…. Just send people cash in the post with messaging that presumes they will do your diary study! 🤣

(I enjoy getting random money in the mail so will definitely incentivize this behaviour by participating)

(I tend to pick one of these depending on what I think the priority or goal is of the person I am talking to.)