
With #OneTeamGovGlobal rapidly approaching, we wanted to profile a few of our international attendees, Kelly Bonner from NZ’s Department of Internal Affairs tells us why they are coming along…
Hi I’m Kelly, One of five of us from New Zealand attending the OneTeamGov event alongside Nick Story, Hazel Pope, Sukhin Rai and Indiana McLauchlan.
We don’t normally work together, we are from different parts of the public service, but we are working as a team as a part of the D7 Digital Exchange programme, which embodies the spirit of the One Team Gov movement.
It is useful for NZ to be at this conference, as although we live on the other side of the world, our government is modelled on the UK way of doing things.
We face similar challenges, such as most effective engagement with our customer, but we have a different perspective to offer and lens through which we view challenges. Our population (and therefore our budget) is a lot smaller. And while that means we don’t necessarily have the resource to pour into solutions, it means that we work with a certain level of flexibility and innovation in how we problem-solve.
While we are excited for the networking opportunities this unconference will provide, we are also looking forward to learning more about collaboration between government departments, taking practical action from within the system and how we can better connect with and work for our customers — the NZ public.

Kelly Bonner is a Product Owner at the Department of Internal Affairs, New Zealand. Thank you for writing this Kelly and see you there!
Want more info about One Team Gov? Find it here:
And here:
With thanks to Debbie, Joanne and the @OneTeamGov Global Comms squad for coordinating this piece.