Launch: Copenhagen Manual
Copenhagen Manual
Welcome to the Copenhagen Manual. Your guide to collect better data on public sector innovation.
What is the Copenhagen Manual?
The Copenhagen Manual is a helping hand for those who are in a position to further data-informed strategies for public sector development or have been given the responsibility for preparing, analysing or communicating a survey on public sector innovation.
Like other instruction manuals, the Copenhagen Manual offers examples of use, handy tips and general warnings. The manual discusses setting strategic goals, communication, reaching respondents, adapting the questionnaire and defining public sector innovation.
Internationally comparable data
The manual offers an opportunity to mirror public sector innovation capacity by way of internationally comparable data. The Copenhagen Manual, with emphasis on the ‚open‘ in Copenhagen is:
- the result of an open co-creation process that welcomed the participation of all interested parties
- based on the open sharing of a multitude of experiences, good and bad
- open to interpretation, making it usable in different national contexts and open to continuous discussion of added practical experience as actors from more countries conduct surveys on public sector innovation
Universally applicable
The Copenhagen Manual is not a definitive standard. It is a practical help, intended to be universally applicable in the sense that it points to important issues and tradeoffs that need to be addressed by anyone seeking to survey public sector innovation successfully.
The manual is universal in spirit without recommending conformity. Public sectors everywhere face challenges, and because they are organised differently their challenges may also differ. The citizens‘ expectations, political will and the possibilities available to public employees differ. Public sector decision makers across the globe need to find a balance between using a purely national survey versus one with internationally comparable data. The Copenhagen Manual is intended to be a helping hand, regardless of the balance.
Joint effort by 60 people
The Copenhagen Manual is the product of a joint effort by 60 people who were encouraged, practically assisted and supported by the Nordic Council of Ministers. What began as an ambition in the five Nordic countries quickly developed into a diverse and expanding community of decision makers, civil servants, innovation consultants, survey experts, statisticians, communications specialists and scholars from 20 countries.
What we share is the belief that public sectors around the globe face numerous challenges that require innovation, but the lack of comparable innovation data should not be one of them.
We invite you to join our community here at innovationbarometer.org
GovLabAustria contributed to the development of the Copenhagen Manual within it´s Project Innovationskompass für die öffentliche Verwaltung.