Mid August Button Insights

Welcome to the mid-August issue of the Button Insight Newsletter!

Need to know

A Checklist for Making the Most of Your Summer Break

5 action items rooted in psychological principles

As the summer sun shines brightly upon Canada’s private business sector, as well as our governments, Members of Parliament (MPs), and Senators, we all need to take a break from our regular duties, and likely find ourselves with reduced staffing, activity levels, and a bit of downtime.

Summer recess is the perfect time to reset and refocus your energies for the upcoming year. If you’re like us here at Button, and like that feeling of being ahead of the game, you might enjoy checking off the items on this optimized checklist anchored in psychological principles.

It is designed to put you in the frame of mind to make the most of your summer downtime, so you can return with a fresh perspective and a renewed passion for your projects in the fall.

Community

A local British Columbia community story for this summer’s mid-August issue: 8 Reasons Why We Love BC’s Updated Digital Plan.

As we’ve written before, digital transformation can be a process as challenging as it is necessary. For governments there is the added challenge of decades of existing bureaucracy and a need to be constantly delivering services—with very high stakes and close public scrutiny. But government digital transformation can produce services that are more accessible and efficient for citizens and businesses, and more streamlined and cost-effective for the government.

Actually carrying out change on this scale requires a team that is knowledgeable and on-board. When that team is thousands of public servants, there needs to be a rigorously structured but very clear and accessible plan that everyone can understand their parts in.

Read the story here.

Worth Your Attention

What We’re Reading: Eiffel’s Tower

Jill Jonnes, who wrote Conquering Gotham about the Gilded age and the construction of Penn Station, delivers the first English-language general history of the Eiffel Tower here with Eiffel's Tower: The Thrilling Story Behind Paris's Beloved Monument and the Extraordinary World's Fair That Introduced It.

This book looks at the challenges of construction (and the public response at the time) but also at the broader context: the 1889 Exposition Universelle / World’s Fair. That event brought in the big names—from Annie Oakley to Thomas Edison—and the big ideas of the era.

It gives an intriguing look at what innovation looked like at a time when the history that we now know was still open-ended. The book takes us to Belle Époque France to show us a picture of the past—and of what they saw for the future.

In Case You Missed It

Check out our blog posts from previous newsletters!

WHAT IS YOUR DIGITAL ‘WHY?’ In the world of digital transformation, all too often we see outcomes without purpose or benefit.

HOW CAN WE TACKLE BURNOUT in a way that gives workers more comfort and stability while also keeping companies and governments productive?

PODCAST REC: The UK’s Government Digital Service Podcast aims to make digital government simpler, clearer, and faster for everyone—and more cost-efficient for the taxpayer.

EMPLOYEE SHOWCASE: Meet Zoey, a service designer by day and aerialist by night.

CASE STUDY: How Button helped the Canada Revenue Agency deliver more robust, inclusive, and empathetic digital solutions for Canadian citizens.

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