Over the past year, Chris Wightman (@cwightman), the City of Ottawa‘s Manager of eMedia, and his team have explored how the city could use social media to improve information sharing among employees and to bring the city closer to citizens.

Chris will be talking at the next Third Tuesday Ottawa about his experience with social media at the city. Chris will describe the hightlights of the city’s exploration of social media, what has worked, what hasn’t worked yet and what comes next.

I think you’ll find that this is a classic case with lessons that anyone in a public service environment can use. From making a business case for each tool being explored through to making the case for open source software, Chris and his team have been there. They’ve also tackled the challenge of educating their colleagues about social media and its potential to help them do their jobs. And they’ve faced the expected corporate concerns of IT system security, privacy, accessibility and, of course, resources.

If you’re in government or a large organization, and you’re looking for inspiration and examples you can use in introducing social media in your work environment, you’ll find Chris’ presentation to be chock full of useful information.

You can register online to attend Third Tuesday Ottawa with the City of Ottawa’s Chris Wightman.

And once again, thank you to our founding sponsor, CNW Group, who have been with us from the outset. Your support enables us to continue to organize better and better Third Tuesdays.