![](media/image1.png){width="1.0409722222222222in"
height="1.0409722222222222in"}

**Number range CHAPTERNomination Form**

**Web Content Managers Best Practice Awards (2005)**

[Best Practice Being Nominated]{.underline}: HUD's Field Web Team

Website URL:
<http://www.hud.gov/library/bookshelf15/procedures/sec1d.cfm>

[Best Practice Category]{.underline} (You can nominate the same website
or agency in more than one

category). Read [descriptions of each category]{.underline}

1.  Website Design

2.  Website Content

3.  Citizen-Focused Online Services

4.  Services for Defined Audiences

5.  **X Governance and Web Management**

[Describe the Best Practice]{.underline} : Please be specific about what
it is, why it\'s a best practice,

evidence that's it's been successful, and how it could be replicated at
other agencies. (limit

one page)

In the early years of HUD's website, each of HUD's 80 field offices
found a volunteer -- sometimes at a high level, sometimes not -- to do a
website for that office. Quality and content were uneven. Though we
urged the local offices to teach staff to use the web and to get out and
market our web products, that was uneven, too. As with everything, you
get what you pay for.

In FY 2000, HUD's Deputy Secretary created a Web Management Task Force
to recommend a way to integrate web management in HUD, to ensure we
would use the web successfully. Two major outcomes of that Task Force
resulted in a huge step forward in HUD's ability to provide high quality
web products for citizens:

1.  It called for creating 10 full-time web managers, skilled in
    writing, editing, and managing content, and

2.  It recommended separating content management duties from technical
    support (coding, posting, etc.)

In fall 2001, HUD's web team reorganized to incorporate 10 new full-time
Regional Web Managers. To ensure the success of the field team, we split
the Departmental Web Manager duties in two -- one Departmental Web
Manager for to lead Headquarters operations and one Departmental Web
Manager to lead field operations. The result of this change has been a
profound improvement in local web content available from HUD's websites,
better training for field staff in using the web, and significantly
better outreach and marketing efforts at the local level.

Working with HUD's Training Academy, we provided a year of intensive
training for this new cadre of Regional Web Managers, with 4 week-long
in-person sessions and weekly conference calls, which continue to this
day, to keep the training ongoing. In subsequent years, we merged the
Regional Web Manager into training with the Headquarters Web Managers,
building a strong Departmental Web Team.

We stopped producing web content organized by field office and started
looking at local content through the eyes of the audience. We worked
together to develop standard templates, both for the Internet and
intranet websites, so that citizens, partners, and employees would get
the same high quality information, no matter where they live and work.
We were entrepreneurial. Regional Web Managers got involved in their
regional management teams, proposing web-related initiatives for annual
management plans, helping the Regional Public Affairs Officers plan
local events, training desk receptionists to use the web-based customer
service directories, and working with managers and staff across the
regions to use the web to achieve HUD's mission and make their jobs
easier.

The results have been remarkable:

-   Easier-to-use, consistent, higher quality information for HUD's
    audiences, especially citizens

-   Better customer service

-   More effective use of the web by field staff

-   Better understanding of web by field management staff

The field team maintains a collaborative "all for one, one for all"
spirit. This extraordinary virtual team works together every day, meets
by conference call once a week, and meets face to face just two or three
times a year. They focus on creating and managing content, providing
management consulting, training staff, marketing and outreach. Technical
support comes from a central contractor. They report directly to
regional management, and function under the guidance of the Departmental
Web Manager for Field Operations.

HUD's Field Web Team has a keen understanding of the agency's many
audiences and their different needs. They bring that "local connection"
that our audiences have told us they want ("sure, I want to know how to
buy a home...but what I really want to know is how to buy a home in
Indiana"). They work on Departmentwide projects with the Headquarters
Web Managers, making sure we never lose track of the regional issues and
perspectives of our audiences.

HUD is one of the first Federal agencies to develop a strong and
well-supported web management team at the field level. As other agencies
move in this direction it will create opportunities for cross-agency
content collaboration, training, and sharing of experience in the
development of local content, making Federal websites even more
accessible to citizens.