In the spring there was a great kerfuffle over an anonymous blogging Civil Servant called Civil Serf.

At the time Tom Watson MP asked for advice on his blog about what guidance should be given to Civil Servants making comment and participating in communities online. He’s now come out with a “Code of Practice”. Here it is, verbatim:

Principles for participation online

1. Be credible

• Be accurate, fair, thorough and transparent.

2. Be consistent

• Encourage constructive criticism and deliberation. Be cordial, honest and professional at all times.

3. Be responsive

• When you gain insight, share it where appropriate.

4. Be integrated

• Wherever possible, align online participation with other offline communications.

5. Be a civil servant

• Remember that you are an ambassador for your organisation. Wherever possible, disclose your position as a representative of your department or agency.

And .. er .. that’s it, apart from a bit more guidance about the Civil Service Code.

In case you are wondering - 79 words.

[Update 23/6/2008: I have experimented and turned the Code into a “Wordle”, which would be good to pin to a wall next to a PC as a reminder…

More detail here (live from 23/6 12:00pm)]

Civil Service Code

This is the extra guidance, again nice and short.

How the Civil Service Code applies to online participation.

The Civil Service Code applies to your participation online as a civil servant or when discussing government business. You should participate in the same way as you would with other media or public forums such as speaking at conferences.

Disclose your position as a representative of your department or agency unless there are exceptional circumstances, such as a potential threat to personal security. Never give out personal details like home address and phone numbers.

Always remember that participation online results in your comments being permanently available and open to being republished in other media. Stay within the legal framework and be aware that libel, defamation, copyright and data protection laws apply. This means that you should not disclose information, make commitments or engage in activities on behalf of Government unless you are authorised to do so. This authority may already be delegated or may be explicitly granted depending on your organisation.

Also be aware that this may attract media interest in you as an individual, so proceed with care whether you are participating in an official or a personal capacity. If you have any doubts, take advice from your line manager.

Sounds about right to me. Congratulations, Tom.

Wrapping Up

The best feature of this code (beyond it’s brevity), is that it is based on principles not practices - so there is room for discretion and flexibility. Simon would have preferred a slightly more evangelistic approach, but I think this will probably do nicely. There’ll be no complaints from here while we see how it works in practice.

As noted in a comment on my post back in March by Alex, what we need now is to apply it to politicians.

Tags: civil serf, civil service blogging code, tom watson, civil service code