1st Best national practice and experience from Portugal

General information

Name of the good practice	LabX – Laboratório de Experimentação da Administração Pública
Name of the organisation or institution in charge of the project	Academia AMA
Address, City
Country	Portugal
1^st project year	2017
Is the project ongoing? (time alive)	Yes
The good practice is to be found at web.address	https://labx.gov.pt/
Website of the organisations	https://www.ama.gov.pt/
E-mail	geral@labx.gov.pt

Short description of the project, of the method

The Agência para a Modernização Administrativa (AMA) is the public institute that carries out the tasks of the Ministry of State Modernisation and Public Administration in the areas of administrative modernisation and simplification and electronic administration in Portugal.

This agency initiated in 2017, an initiative the experimental projects called LabX – Laboratório de Esperimentaão da Administraão Pública, it drives the vision of transforming the Public Administration in a space where daily practices are continuously questioned and innovation, incremental or disruptive, is considered and tested in order to improve the Public Service.

To transform the Public Administration in a space open to collaboration beyond organizational boundaries, sensitive to the aspirations of society, where public services are designed for and with Citizens and Companies. A challenging space to work in, where public servants are proactive agents of change, true experimenters and entrepreneurs.

This project is developed to improve the viability of the same is included in a temporary closed space (36 months), the main objective is:

Train the Public Administration with methodologies that leverage innovation, creating a Network of Innovators
Develop 12 innovative projects, covering the phases of research, co-creation and experimentation

General objective

The Public Administration Experimentation Laboratory (LabX) was born to be a safe experimentation space to investigate, co-create and test innovative solutions to improve public services, focusing on the needs and expectations of citizens and businesses.

The main objective of the LabX is to improve the public administration, in training, methodology, innovation, through testing and practical application of solutions in real environments. Offering both training and support to professionals, both public and corporate, as well as to citizens.

It is based four main activities:

Experimentation:
The projects framed within the activities of experimentation allow, with the help of public entities together with the community of entrepreneurs, the scientific system and society, to manage to develop experimental initiatives that solve real needs of citizens and companies.

Exploration:

LabX training activities focus on improving the training and skills of the entire government ecosystem, enhancing change and innovation.

Within this activity LabX has three complementary training offerings:

Pro’LabX where methodologies are tested and improved
Real test with immersive collaboration sessions to visualize real challenges
Mentoring services to support groups participating in pilot projects ensure methodological support and meet their challenges.

Training:

The connection system offered by the LabX initiative brings together all the statuses of society, managing to improve and solve real problems and applied methodologies.

Connection:

The connection system offered by the LabX initiative brings together all the statuses of society, managing to improve and solve real problems and applied methodologies.

Target groups – participants

The LabX project brings together several initiatives, to try and test various solutions in different environments. In all these initiatives, during these two years the LabX has worked with:

More than 300 public administration employees were trained, 46 public administration organizations were contacted, and 11 pilot projects were carried out involving about 7,000 citizens and 1,200 public employees.

Which resources were necessary for the project?

For the implementation of this project, the most important tools are the knowledge and the involvement of social entities, the collaboration of the public administrations, the public workers and their involvement has been obtained.

On the other hand, we have collaborated with the scientific community and expert panels, to improve methodologies and to know the real problems.

Similarly, the public has collaborated in carrying out field work, training in innovation and testing.

Why it has been selected as good practice

This good practice has been selected for several reasons, the most important is its integrator nature, that it solves real problems with people in real situations.

The LabX looking for the best solution for that problems or prevent it with innovation, methodology and training activities. It works with diverse stats from the society to know all different point of views.

By having many projects of different nature to solve different situations, a better knowledge of the adult profile of people is achieved.

In the same way, it has been a reference in different news and articles: