FINAL GPSJ Summer edition 2024 ONLINE VERSION.2pdf - Flipbook - Page 46
GPSJ
CENTRAL GOVERNMENT
Digital transformation relies on
data – but does the civil service really
understand it?
Under its newly appointed
Chief Strategy Officer, Gina
Gill, the CDDO has now kicked
off a project intended to solve
urgent governmental issues
around “data quality”. Whilst
undoubtedly important, this
overlooks a vital first step; that
is, educating the civil service
on what exactly “data” itself is.
Indeed, across the Government,
the term is often conflated with
its analysis and/or the insights it
can provide.
focuses not just on improving the
collection and measurement of data,
but also on elevating education
around it more widely. Indeed, many
civil servants, despite perhaps
lacking in-depth education on the
topic – have strong aspirations for
the potential, radically positive impact
that an improved data strategy would
have upon almost all aspects of
civilian life. The Government should
look to leverage this ambition.
All operations and outcomes – both
in the public and private sectors
– rely on data. As such, building
and implementing a more effective
data strategy will be fundamental to
the success of central government
initiatives going forward. Therefore,
it is essential that any new strategy
Although focusing the One Big Thing
on data upskilling last year was a
crucial step to improving the civil
service’s education around data,
this did not go far enough. The
training focused on how data can be
transformed into insights, rather than
the underlying mechanics of how
Educational foundations
Neil Mclvor
it flows through systems, where it
comes from and how to acquire it –
what I term the ‘get-put-use’ model.
There is a widespread assumption
that relevant data is simply available,
on tap, that it readily moves through
systems and that valuable insights
can be easily drawn from it. Stripping
the training back to instead consider
and interrogate what data itself is
and how it is inextricably linked
to business processes, before
incorporating learning modules that
address all of its different elements
(measurement, analysis, insights,
et. cetera) would go a long way in
empowering civil servants to derive
more value from data.
Building these educational
foundations is also the first step
to democratising data within the
civil service. If individuals better
understand the nature of the
information they are requesting,
and where it comes from, they can
more effectively use it for decisionmaking (rather than relying solely
on designated data teams to do
so). Necessary security guardrails
should and must remain in place,
but opening up data access in this
way could exponentially increase
efficiencies across departments.
Developing the architecture
The current data infrastructure
also has limitations that need to be
recognized, along with systemic
challenges that must be tackled.
In part, this is due to the fact that,
historically, the government’s
approach to data has naturally been
more reactive than proactive. In other
words, significant developments
have been driven by need or
emergency.
For example, COVID-19 drove
some seismic breakthroughs for
the Government when it came to
unlocking the power of data. In the
Department for Education, the data
teams built a system that measured,
in real-time, how many children and
teachers were in school every day,
as well as their reasons for being
off sick. This information, and the
insights it provided, then informed
resultant governmental decisions,
tapping into the true value that
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GOVERNMENT AND PUBLIC SECTOR JOURNAL SUMMER 2024
data can provide when it comes
to benefitting society. Furthermore,
the resulting infrastructure was later
used in the publication of the official
statistics around teachers’ industrial
action in February 2023, which went
on to win the 2023 Campion Award
for Excellence in Official Statistics.
While necessity will always be the
mother of invention and this period
showed what was possible, it is
essential that a balance is struck
here. The Government still needs
to look to innovate and develop
data infrastructure and pipelines
outside of such acute situations,
to be better prepared for and more
resilient against future shocks.
What’s more, when effective systems
are created, like those developed
by the Department for Education,
they must be systematised and
automated across departments to
prevent a ‘cottage industry’ effect.
This will help to address the fact that,
although there are pockets of truly
groundbreaking work going on, on a
macro level, capabilities around data
remain relatively siloed within and
across departments.
Redefining the future
The government undeniably faces
a complex challenge in developing
and executing a new data strategy;
namely, a smaller civil service,
budget cuts, and the substantial
investment required for enhancing
end-to-end infrastructure. However,
digital transformation cannot happen
without data transformations,
particularly as departments look
towards applying technologies like
AI. As such, a new data strategy
is the first step to driving radical
change across all aspects of public
service and ensuring that projects
provide maximum value right from
their inception. This begins with
education.
Neil Mclvor is the Head of Data
for Public Services at technology
consultancy, esynergy. Previously,
he was Chief Data Officer at the
Department for Education and
has 23-year career spanning five
government departments.