Data and research led decision making

Mission 1: Data management 

Embed strong data management practices to ensure that we understand and trust our data and use it effectively to deliver our transformational programmes.

• Maintain and update an organisational wide information asset register alongside a metadata repository
• Identify the critical datasets across the council and improve their quality
• Implement common data standards across the council
• Promote data sharing between teams and ensure that critical datasets are linkage-ready

Mission 2:  Research

Promote a cross-council culture where research outputs are used by decision makers to target services where they will have the most impact in improving residents' lives, reducing inequalities and reducing future demand.

• Build our capacity and capability to commission, co-produce and use research
• Ensure decision makers have easy and timely access to the current knowledge base
• Identify and prioritise research that will support the delivery of our strategic transformational programmes
• Create strong collaborations with other public bodies and research institutions to commission new research and apply for funding

Mission 3: Data skills  

Ensure staff and members have the data skills they need to work more efficiently and deliver better outcomes.

• Build capability and capacity of analysts, performance officers, report writers, and others to present data and analysis clearly and effectively
• Implement a training program in areas of high demand (survey/data collection design, analysis and visualisation, data quality and data linkage)
• Create communities of practice to share knowledge and best practice in data related subjects

Mission 4: Analysis and visualisation

Support decision makers with high-quality analysis and visualisation so that they can be confident they see all the relevant information and are empowered to find the optimum path balancing needs and priorities.

• Choose the most appropriate tools so that outputs are accessible quickly
• Harness both qualitative and quantitative data analysis
• Work with service leads to identify gaps

Mission 5: Innovation

Explore new and innovative ways of using data and technology to drive efficiency and quality of our services

• Experiment with Internet of Things, machine learning and cutting-edge AI
• Learn from other organisations
• Ensure that staff are supported to translate innovative ideas into improvements in service and efficiency

• Knowing our data assets will enable us to make better decisions and to ‘Work smarter’. We will have a better understanding of how our data can support the delivery of our corporate plans, and we will be able to prioritise improvements to critical data assets.
• Managing and improving the quality of our data assets will increase our ability to rely on and trust them, reduce risks (reputational and others) and costs associated with poor quality data, reduce duplication and save time for staff and customers.
• Adopting industry-agreed data standards across the council will help us gather relevant data, ensure consistency, seamlessly integrate internal systems, and connect with external open data sets. This will enhance the value of our data, boost efficiency, and minimise costly errors.
• Linking datasets will provide a broader, more holistic view and lead to new insights that were unavailable to us before.
• A better understanding of the current body of knowledge and research will enable senior management to base their decisions on robust evidence.
• With the right research we will have a better understanding of the lived experience of seldom heard groups. This will allow us to provide them with better services.
• Analysis of our services and their outcomes will enable managers to understand if expected outcomes for residents are being realised.
• When our data is kept secure then there is more trust in the way we use it.
• Collaboration across a wide range of sectors and organisations will be essential to achieve our goals because as a council we do not have all these skills in-house.
• Staff who have the right data skills will be able to be confident in using data to plan and deliver their services.

• Be Agile: start with small well-defined projects and develop where most benefit can be achieved.
• Follow the recommendations of the Data Maturity Assessment.
• Work with relevant stakeholders to manage critical data sets.
• Continue to develop our data science platform to share data science outputs across the council. These outputs will vary from descriptive visualisations to statistical analysis and predictive modelling.
• Communicate about our work to maximise its benefit.
• Create data career paths and continue to ensure our staff have the right skills by promoting training in data and creating communities of practice.
• Foster strong collaborations with partners from academia, public health, statutory bodies, voluntary organisations and the community to co-create new research that will give us the evidence we need to inform policy and practice.
• Develop crucial research governance, capacity and capability and work towards our data being research ready.
• Consider ethics when it comes to data, privacy, and implementing new technology.