OpenGov’s Zac Bookman On Doing “About the Hardest Thing”: Trying To Transform U.S. Governments

You may have heard about it already. OpenGov is a nearly four-year-old, cloud-based platform that state and local governments — as well as cities, counties, and school districts — are beginning to use for financial and other performance intelligence.

OpenGov’s big idea: to enable these public administrators to see what’s going on internally and to communicate their findings to elected officials, all with the aim of helping each of them operate more effectively (and reduce waste).

Investors like Andreessen Horowitz, Formation 8 and Thrive Capital like the idea so much, they’ve already plugged nearly $50 million into the company, which says it’s now working with 750 entities around the country.

Still, what OpenGov wants to do is easier said than done. In Davos last week, we sat down with the company’s CEO and cofounder, Zac Bookman, to delve into just how big a mountain the company is having to climb to realize its vision. (You can skip to around the 3:30 mark to jump past some of the small talk.)

Photo: Courtesy of Liz Hafalia; the San Francisco Chronicle.