Civic Punks

I recorded this conversation with Kateryna Frolova, Head of the Global Government Technology Centre Kyiv, on my first morning in Ukraine, after a night of Russian bombing. We were both running on a little less sleep than we would have liked.

But the conversation we had gets at a problem that reaches far beyond Ukraine.

Governments everywhere love talking abo...

Ukraine has become one of the most interesting governments in the world to watch when it comes to AI.

In this episode of Civic Punks, I sit down with Roman Kyslyi, Chief AI Officer at Ukraine’s Ministry of Digital Transformation, to dig into where Ukraine is going next.

We get deep into AI sovereignty, a topic Roman has been thinking about for years. W...

Last week, I shared my conversation with Victoria Itskovych, CIO for the City of Kyiv, about how Kyiv has continued to build and adapt under some pretty extraordinary circumstances.

• Six Weeks Under Siege

Denys Nazarenko helped make that conversation happen. He’s a senior advisor to Victoria, and after we finished the interview, Denys and I ...

I started the European leg of this journey in Ukraine—a war zone, which is kind of a mad thing to do.

I went to Ukraine because I think they are the most interesting case of government transformation in the world right now. Case in point, my first conversation.

Victoria Iskovich, CIO and Director of IT for the City of Kyiv, takes us inside the first si...

Olivia Dorey has been supporting Civic Punks since before Civic Punks had a name.

So it feels pretty special to finally sit down with her — and to announce The Kindred Agency as our first sponsor.

In this conversation, we get into Olivia’s story: how she became a Civic Punk, why she started The Kindred Agency, and what she has learned about build...

Tokyo was already special. Getting to spend time with Chika Masuda made it even better.

Chika is Head of Intelligence Research at Japan’s Digital Agency, and one of those rare public servants who seems to connect people, ideas, and institutions with real care. In this conversation, we talk about her journey into government, what she has learned from working inside the system, and why relationships matter so much in this field...

What does it look like when a city council takes both AI and community engagement seriously — without making either feel like a corporate strategy exercise?

In this episode, I talk with Jared Griffith, a senior leader at Hutt City Council in Greater Wellington, New Zealand. This conversation follows a chat Jared and I had when I was in Wellington a few months ago, where I became really intrigued by two things Hutt City Counci...

Leg two of the Civic Punks World Tour is here.

I’m heading to Europe — with stops in Kyiv, London, Berlin, Tallinn, Helsinki, Copenhagen, and Tbilisi — to look for the people, places, and ideas shaping the future of government.

The heart of the trip is Kyiv. Ukraine feels like one of the most important places in the world to understand democracy, resilience, digital government, trust, and public service under pres...

Governments around the world are trying to make sense of AI in real time. Some are experimenting, some are regulating, some are cautiously poking it with a stick from a safe distance.

In this episode, our global government innovation panel compares what we are seeing across different countries and systems. We talk about how AI is changing public sector innovation, why digital sovereignty is becoming such a big deal, and what all of...

Civic Punks is starting to come into focus.

In this short solo update, I’m back at Queen’s Park — where I filmed the original launch video — to share where the project is going next.

Over the last few months, I’ve been travelling across East Asia and the Pacific, meeting people, recording conversations, going to events, and trying to understand what the future of government looks like from the ground. ...

In this episode of the Future Government series, I sit down with Sir Geoff Mulgan, one of the people whose work has deeply shaped the field of public sector innovation — and, personally, someone I remember studying back in grad school.

So this was a bit of a special one.

We talk about why governments need to get much better at using intelligence, how history can help us make sense of the moment we are living through, and why ...

Thea Snow is one of those people I love talking to because I always leave our conversation feeling a little more grounded and wise.

At the time of this recording, Thea was Director at the Centre for Public Impact for Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand. She has since stepped back from that role and is taking time to enjoy life, reflect, and explore what comes next.

In this conversation, we cover a lot of ground: local empowerment, t...

What if one of the problems in government is that we keep using the wrong pattern for the work in front of us?

In this conversation, I sit down with Suhit Anantula to explore his framework of Lines, Loops, and Vibes. Vibes are about instinct, intuition, and sensing what is emerging. Loops are about iteration, experimentation, feedback, and learning by doing. Lines are about structure, process, and scaling what has become clear.

The...

Public sector innovation was supposed to help government change.

But what happens when innovation becomes part of the system it was meant to challenge?

In this conversation, I sit down with Nicholas Gruen, a longtime voice in public sector innovation, to talk about why the field may have lost some of its edge. We get into perpetual pilots, reform work that never quite lands, and the strange way innovation can become another layer o...

Roger Watson has been one of the leading voices shaping the practice of design in government in Australia — as a practitioner, teacher, author, and long-time champion of better public services.

I sat down with Roger in Sydney to talk about how he found his way into this work, the personal experiences that shaped his interest in government design, and why he believes the field needs to evolve.

We also dig into the idea of Desi...

There’s a lot of pressure right now to be more efficient, more effective, and somehow keep up with a steady stream of new tools—especially AI. In this conversation, I sit down with Michael Baskin, Chief Innovation Officer for Montgomery County, to talk about how he actually approaches that challenge in his work and life.

This isn’t just a conversation about tools. It’s about process, judgment, and the underl...

This is part of a series I’m calling Rent Free. The idea is simple. I ask people about a concept that’s living rent-free in their head. Something that’s shaping how they see the world and how they show up in their work. This time, I sat down with my good friend, and someone who consistently inspires me, Almero Oosthuizen. For Almero, what is living rent-free is the quote: “I participate, therefore I am.&rd...

I think we’re still designing policy for a world that doesn’t exist anymore. Last week I was in Canberra for the OpenFisca and Policy Innovation Conference, right after Government Innovation Week in Melbourne. Two very different conferences… and honestly, it felt like they were talking about two completely different realities. At OpenFisca, the conversation went deeper. Less about “what’s new&rdqu...