Tag: Journey
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Zen Updates – Mar ’26
Hi again 🙂 Zen Citizen Rwanda This month we are excited to share that our volunteer Gaius has launched ‘Zen Citizen Rwanda’. Gaius has been with us for a year now, mainly helping with our website. In his words, “I came to deeply appreciate the kind of impact regular citizens can create, and made a…
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Making Remote Volunteer Teams Work Across Time Zones – Lessons from Civic Compass
What is Civic Compass Like every Zen project, Civic Compass provides essential, crucial, yet hard-to-find information. In this case, tool where you could just enter an address in Bengaluru and instantly see the BBMP, BDA, Revenue, BESCOM, BWSSB offices, and Police stations, for that location. All in one place. How it started: A “lazy question”…
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Spectrum of Reactions for Zen Citizen: Strong Support to Outright Dismissiveness
I’ve had some interesting conversations over the last couple of weeks – three heads of civic engagement organizations, one retired bureaucrat, and a high-ranking bureaucrat. All the civic organizations actively supported ZenCitizen. A couple even offered their resources, including office space. The retired bureaucrat was lukewarm about the outcome but still encouraged me to give…
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Why Khata and Allied Services
For Phase 1 of ZenC, I’m focusing on detailing processes for Khata transfers and related services, like updating names on electricity and water bills, and generating Property IDs. This decision stems from feedback I received on Reddit when I asked for suggestions on bribe-heavy services to prioritize, with a recurring theme of property-related services. One…
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“What do you see as the ‘end-state’?”
I get this question a lot. If the pilot is successful, my ideal end-state vision for Zen Citizen would be: For now, though, my focus is on the proof of concept with ZenC. One breath at a time! 🙂
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Sunday with BBMP
Following my visit to the BBMP, I met with the representative who had shared his contact information – let’s call him D – and the meeting went exactly as I had hoped. I was curious about his willingness to meet me on a Sunday, especially at a place I had suggested near the BBMP office,…
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Bottoms-up
I initially hoped for a top-down approach for the Zen Citizen experiment. It seemed efficient and scalable: I could scour forums for issues, questions, and confusions about current procedures, then get all necessary clarifications from 1-2 officials who genuinely wanted to make things better for the common man. We would quickly determine if revamping content…