For us here at WebsEdge it’s a busy time. We’re working on a new initiative this year - the Local Government Challenge - where we bring two teams of aspirant local authority chief executives together to work on a number of leadership challenges. It’s fun and exciting and a very different way of seeing who is up to the mark. If you haven’t been following it please take a look here on our local government channel website.

And we’re working on a whole host of public sector television projects here in the UK. Later this month we’re covering conferences on people management and culture for the local government channel. And then in April it’s the first ever Surgeons TV for the Association of Surgeons in Britain and Ireland. And whilst the UK public sector market remains challenging there’s still plenty for us to get our teeth into.

But a growing amount of our work is in the US now. In June for example we have two major conferences to cover for our Global Health TV Channel -Women Deliver and the Global Health Council’s Annual Conference. Both take place in Washington DC and both tackle progress on meeting the UN’s Millennium Development Goals.

These are obviously exciting projects. And the filming for them takes us all over the world. One segment alone takes us from the US to Haiti, Afghanistan and Malawi! The logistics are challenging but we really enjoy making such relevant content.

So it’s already been an exciting year and we’re not even a quarter through. Let’s not kid ourselves - it’s going to remain economically challenging for some time to come but I can’t help but feel that as the world continues it’s journey out of recession opportunity is still out there as long as you know where to find it.

We’re busy now making programmes on the green economy in Washington DC and next week working on the Local Government Association’s Climate Change conference in Liverpool.  Interesting stuff and certainly makes you think and I think I can spot a theme there!

In between we’re developing a couple of new formats. One in particular is grabbing our attention at the moment. We’ve just started filming the Local Government Leadership Challenge. In short it pitches two teams of aspirant chief executives together to work on challenges to find our leaders of the future. The first of these programmes will be on the Local Government Channel website next week and I’m really looking forward to see how they do.

So we’ve certainly hit the ground running. And as I pause for breath I can’t help thinking about how this translates into the wider economy. Certainly there’s a degree of optimism going around - a new bounce into people’s step. But whilst the pace is frenetic it isn’t guaranteed to continue. Everything seems very short term. It’s as if we know there are clouds on the horizon and we’re stopping ourselves from getting too excited. Let’s just hope someone got his weather forecast wrong as well!

Right now the Local Government Channel is involved in its own talent search. We’ve teamed up with the Local Government Association to run the Local Government Leadership Challenge.

Based very loosely on the concept of the Apprentice, ok I’ve got my shows a little mixed up here, the idea is to set two teams of individuals from councils throughout the country a number of challenges to revitalise their communities. There are various of these ranging from promoting local libraries and other services to giving a boost to the local high street.

And we’ve got off to a flying start. The contestants have been chosen, the challenges set and everything kicks off in January. We’re going to be filming every one of them and posting the results on our web site. So be sure to tune in to see how the candidates are getting on.

A little light hearted but with a very serious message. Our attention is often drawn to high profile talents on a national and international stage. But very often there’s some excellent work being done on our own doorsteps and it is high time we recognised it!

But that aside there were plenty of issues there for us to get our heads round. Should skills or education top the agenda, should it be locally or centrally controlled and who is going to pay for it all anyway?

You got the distinct feeling that the election was already underway with politicians of every hue parading their wares in front of us. Even Lord Mandelson had to justify his Department’s policies to a packed plenary session.

Exciting as all this was I couldn’t escape the feeling that there was actually more going on here and that it was a celebration of Further Education. The teachers and lecturers here were really focused on one thing – how to bring the best out of their students.

There was also a real focus on employability and recognition. It’s no longer enough just to provide a first class education but you’ve also got to provide students with the real life skills to land them a job at the end of it.

Dig a little deeper still and you found that all this was underpinned by quite startling innovation. One college I spoke to made podcasts of all their lectures and actually enabled students to file their class work in the same way. Quite simply a rate of innovation unheard of in even our own industry.

So it seems to me that as long as the politicians don’t mess it up our future is in safe hands. Our students are not only equipped to face the future but they are up for the challenge as well. Which is just as well given the competition they face from their Asian competitors.

This is our first conference in China and has certainly been an eye opener. The numbers alone are staggering. There are hundreds of universities here from all over the world and the doors opened yesterday to some 30, 000 students. And as this Expo visits five Chinese cities there are plenty of logistics to get your head around.

And what of the television programmes themselves. Well there are obviously some differences. Everything has to be translated into both languages of course but apart from that the processes are pretty similar. So far so good.

But there are major differences in the content of the programmes. Everywhere we’ve been this year the discussions have focused on dealing with the recession. But not here. It’s still all about growth. Particularly in the education sector, because the Chinese have targeted good education as a means of gaining competitive advantage and there seems to be no letting up in that approach.

But how can students, and their parents, afford this expensive education, especially as incomes remain considerably lower than in the western world? It comes down to saving and investment. Families save a considerable portion of their incomes and they see education as an investment in the family’s future. Perhaps that’s a lesson we could all learn from.

Well it’s our busy time of year here at WebsEdge. We’re currently working on tv projects ranging from university admissions to crime and law enforcement. And we’re on our travels too – Liverpool in September, Beijing in October and New Orleans in November amongst many others.

To kick this season off I’ve just come back from Montreal where, for the fourth time, we’ve been producing a series of tv programmes for the International City Managers Association Annual Conference. Before and during the event we talked to city managers from all over the world. And of course the main subject for conversation was the recession.

What really surprised me was the amount of consensus. Everyone it seems has been effected by it. Everyone feels the worst is over and yet everyone is wary about the recovery. What shape will it take and how will we even know it’s here?

Not surprisingly being in Montréal we worked with quite a number of Canadian cities. And it was really refreshing to do so. Canadian cities, it seems are investing heavily in their communities future and they can afford to do that because the recession in Canada has been less severe than in many other countries. And that I think says a lot about their desire to build a sustainable future without getting too involved in economic bubbles that all too often leads to economic bust.

And it’s been a busy couple of weeks too. I’m just back from Beijing and Shanghai ahead of our first conference tv season in China. We’re producing a series of television programmes for the Chinese Education Expo which encourages Chinese students to study abroad. Over 100,000 young people are likely to take up that opportunity to give themselves an insight into foreign cultures and pick up new skills.

And whilst some of those students are funded by the State the vast majority are paid for out of savings. And it’s a lot of money. But the young people and their families see it very much as an investment in the future.

Because that’s very much the story in China at the moment – investment. In infrastructure, in overseas companies and in the workforce itself. And you can see it start to pay off. With growth rates of still around 7 per cent China is likely to come out of this global slowdown as not just a regional economic superpower but as a dominant player on the world stage.

So I’m about to leave all this for now and take a couple of weeks break with my family in Scotland. Gives me a chance to re-charge the batteries and do something to shift that work-life balance. I just hope the competition hasn’t got even tougher when I get back!

And it’s been great. We’ve had more finalists than before, more categories and more votes. And the dinner in Harrogate earlier this month was a big success. Judging by all the tapping fingers and smiles the politicians and chief executives really enjoyed the evening.

Of course the most important people there were the finalists themselves. We hold a private lunch for them earlier in the day and it is a real privilege to meet them all and put names to faces. It’s also quite a humbling experience. Because this is truly a diverse group of people who have done so much to benefit the community in which they live.

But all that not withstanding the night itself belonged to Barry. I’m obviously talking about Barry Snowdon from Mansfield Borough Council. Barry won the award for Bravery after he spotted a petrol station about to catch fire and put out the blaze at great personal risk.

Barry was in the right place at the right time because Barry is a street cleaner. And people look down at Barry. But his pride in his work is tangible – you can almost touch it. And if the rest of us went about our work the same way as Barry does the world would be a much better place.

The proposals on broadband seem fair enough. People need access to it for all kinds of reasons these days and it seems unfair to prejudice people because of their postcode. Even though the speeds being discussed are hardly likely to send most consumers rushing to watch on-line television channels.

But I can’t say the same for the rest. Having spent several years working at the BBC I’d be the first to make my many moans and complaints heard. But I’d also be quick to recognise that the BBC is a world-renowned centre for excellence. I’ve worked in a multitude of different markets and nowhere have I found a craft base to compare with the Beeb.

And surprisingly I also think it provides excellent value for money. Now, granted, if we were starting from here we probably wouldn’t re-invent a tax funded monolith like the BBC. But we aren’t starting from here and I think tinkering with it now will set a dangerous precedent for years to come.

But that’s not my main gripe with ‘Digital Britain’. What bothers me is the unimaginative approach to the current funding crisis. Instead of looking creatively at future models all we’re really doing is looking backwards at a tax/revenue model. And this I think has two main consequences. It creates a dependency model for news providers. If there’s 130 million pounds worth of BBC revenue up for grabs that beats having to work it out for yourself.

And critically because they’re not paying directly for the services provided it also takes consumer choice out of the equation. Instead of the Government paying for a service regardless of need shouldn’t we be looking at demand driven models. Surely one thing we know about the digital age is that a proliferation of channels doesn’t necessarily mean more choice.

So two cheers for the report in terms of infrastructure – or as the Lord Carter would say the ‘pipes’. But I would have loved to see some more creative commercial thinking with regard to news provision. Mind you I suspect we’re going to see many months of ‘consultation’ before any of this truly sees the light of day.

But it’s not that easy is it? For one thing what about unemployment? The number of people out of work continues to rise. It’s all right calling it a lagging indicator but what good is that to someone out of work now. What good is that to millions of families throughout the western world without incomes?

And what about debt? Sure the downturn isn’t as bad as it was. But that’s hardly surprising given the amount of government money thrown at it. Just this week President Obama admitted that the US Government was just plain out of cash when it came to bailouts.

Which brings me on to local authorities – city governments in all the major countries. In many ways the recession has re-defined the roles of local government. People are looking to councils for leadership in an unprecedented manner. Councils are now getting involved in building homes, lending money and providing jobs to their communities. It’s leading to a whole new relationship with constituents. Another area where this is happening is communications. Given the explosion in the use of the internet and the demise of the local newspapers councils are at the heart of a completely new way of civic engagement.

And there’s the rub. These changes have been brought about because of need, not choice. People need help with homes and jobs and they’re turning to the council for that. And yet the various government bailouts have burdened us with unprecedented levels of debt. So the next few years are bound to see heavy spending curbs coming from central government just when the need is at its greatest. Which is going to force on councils not just new ways of working but new economic models to support them as well.