Data Bites #51

Our 51st Data Bites - the second at Public Digital following its move from the Institute for Government - was the last of the year, and the last before Christmas. To mark the occasion, I did some very serious data analysis to prove that it’s not just you - Christmas is indeed getting earlier.

But that was a mere stocking filler for the main gifts - four more fantastic presentations with different perspectives on data. You can watch the episode below or listen to it on SoundCloud. 

Data Bites is a monthly meet-up designed to showcase interesting data projects in and around the public sector. Four brilliant speakers each get eight minutes to present – there are eight bits in a byte, hence eight minutes in a Data Bite – followed by eight minutes of Q&A. You can sign up for the next one – join us in person in London or online at 6pm on Thursday 6 February.

Our first speaker was Sian, Co Chief Executive of Data Orchard, who presented on ‘Data Maturity, are we there yet? A comparison of sectors and their progress’. This drew from Data Orchard’s latest annual ‘State of the Sector’ report.

See Sian's slides and highlights from her presentation here.

Anna, data quality lead at the London Borough of Hounslow, shared her experience of developing a data practitioners network and the benefits they can bring to local authorities. Her slides finish with some really useful resources, and she is hoping to turn the work into a short ebook soon.

We also ask our speakers – if they have time! – to answer a standard set of questions. Here are Anna’s answers:

• Can you summarise your project in a few sentences? Data is a service. Not a Dashboard. Setting up a Data Practitioners Network is the solution to transforming the ways in which public sector organisations can operate more effectively by enabling in-house expertise.

• What problem are you trying to solve? If Data is a Service, how can we support each public sector organisation to service all its multiple and complex business streams? A Data Practitioners Network might be the solution.

• What difference will it make to citizens? All Data Are Local. Understanding our local data is the start to working out how best we can service our residents.

• How will you know when it’s succeeded? More inclusive and participatory data practices, with impact measurement informed and curated by residents themselves!

• What are the main hurdles? Embedding the community of practice into job descriptions, and as part of the Data Culture within the organisation.

• If you could change one thing about data in government, what would it be? I would start with the premise that Data is a Service, and we all exist in data cultures. With this in mind, is the data service offered by existing approaches in government offering a user experience that is aligned to the needs of the users?

See Anna's slides and highlights from her presentation here.

Adam - the first virtual speaker since Data Bites moved to Public Digital - is the Lead for UK-wide Data Coherence at the Office for National Statistics. Unsurprisingly, his presentation was all the coherence of UK-wide data - what it is, why it matters, and how we can improve it.

See Adam's slides and highlights from his presentation here. 

Ria (Senior Project Manager, Place at Arts Council England) and Jason (Director of Development, Five10Twelve) talked about the Culture and Place Data Explorer they have built, and how they approached the project together.

Here are Ria and Jason’s answers to our questions:

• Can you summarise your project in a few sentences? Arts Council England has launched the Culture and Place Data Explorer (the Explorer) an interactive tool that allows users to map investment in culture and creativity with over 200 other data indicators that tell us more about people and places across the country.

The Explorer allows users to:

• build a profile of the cultural and creative infrastructure in a specific area, with over 200 data indicators, all in one place

• instantly compare data in a specific area with data from other towns, or cities, or regional and national statistics

• produce and download customisable and detailed reports, charts and tables
  

• What problem are you trying to solve? Arts Council England has designed the Explorer to provide users with a detailed hyper-local picture of where our funding is reaching, and where there are opportunities to improve access and engagement and where or for what local need - beyond cultural provision - this funding should be targeted. The aim is for this to encourage a data-enabled and evidence-based approach to cultural development across the country, with multiple public data sources within the Explorer easily accessible.

• What difference will it make to citizens? The wealth of data provided by the Explorer will provide access to vital information to allow citizens to understand both where Arts Council England funding is currently allocated, and where engagement could be improved. The tool will also provide easy-to-access details of the demographics, challenges and opportunities facing local communities.

• How will you know when it’s succeeded? Increased use of data and evidence within cultural planning, directly using the Explorer as the source. This has the potential to lead to more in depth development of cultural strategies, to further support policy development and increase place based cultural development, in turn directly benefitting local communities.

• What are the main hurdles? Ensuring the data within the Explorer is managed, maintained and remains agile. The product will need to remain flexible and as policy and the funding landscape changes the Explorer will need to be updated in a timely manner, so it stays relevant. There are also multiple data products available, or in development, to support cultural planning so ensuring the Explorer remains visible is also very important.

• If you could change one thing about data in government, what would it be? More national data to be made publicly available at smaller geographies - Local Authority level as a minimum, ideally down to LSOA level. National data and statistics are great for building up the bigger picture, but this does not help support localised place-based strategies, policies or funding initiatives that seek to address regional and local inequalities.

See Ria & Jason's slides and highlights from their presentation here.

If you’d like to present at a future Data Bites, or would like to recommend someone, please get in touch!

Photos by Paul Clarke.