The public sector gets serious about data maturity, but how serious?

The public sector appears to have taken a bigger interest in data maturity recently, and we’ve seen a spate of ‘strategies’, ‘frameworks’ and ‘hubs’ launched. But this is one area where activity seems to have diverged across the four nations of the UK.

So what’s happening, and how seriously is data maturity being taken across the different parts of the UK? Our Data and Digital Innovation Director Ben Proctor gives us a summary.

A slow moving area

I’m going to assume that you know what data maturity is and why the public sector might be interested in it. If I’m wrong you might want to have a look at our “What is data maturity?” page.

Around the time we developed our data maturity model for non-profits (in 2016), Nesta developed a data maturity model for local government. At the time, they said: “Our desk research suggested that no UK-specific local government data maturity frameworks existed”.

Since then data maturity has bubbled up only now and again in public sector discussions. For example, in 2018, Audit Wales (then called the WAO) announced: “Local Government needs to do more to develop a strong data culture”.

In the same year the Local Government Association in England created a self-assessment tool based on the Nesta model. It’s not clear how many organisations use this. It certainly hasn’t stopped public sector bodies making use of our Data Maturity Assessment.

In 2017, I talked about “The Ladder of Data Awesomeness” at a Welsh Government TEDx, but data maturity was not top of the agenda in most of the public sector.

A heating up of interest

Recently though it does feel that something is beginning to shift in at least some parts of the UK.

Scotland

The Scottish Government has recently completed a consultation on its digital strategy. It is proposing to create “a Data Transformation Framework to improve data reuse in the Scottish Public Sector”. This will enable Scottish public bodies “to understand their data maturity with steps and support to improve”.

England/UK

UK Government has created a Data Quality Hub along with a Data Quality Framework. Data quality is, arguably, only one aspect of data maturity but the government guidance shows how data quality and data maturity are linked. We get a namecheck in there for our Data Maturity Framework in this guidance (which is nice) and there are examples of government departments using data maturity assessments to inform their strategies.

Wales

Wales is consulting on a digital strategy and, as in Scotland, data is firmly placed within this. The “Data and collaboration” mission doesn’t talk about data maturity specifically but it does rather imply that work will be undertaken to improve data maturity. Wales now has a “Chief Digital Officer (CDO) ecosystem” with CDOs in the health system, local government as well as the Welsh Government CDO. This has the potential to facilitate a very Welsh approach to public sector improvement. We will have to see.

Northern Ireland

Only Northern Ireland doesn’t seem to be talking about data maturity at the moment. The Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive have had a slightly different emphasis around data and digital compared to the other administrations in the UK. In particular they have for some years talked a good game on Open Data (and continue to do so). We’re working with Belfast City Council and over 100 of their employees recently took our Data Maturity Assessment. If there are other data maturity initiatives in NI we’d love to hear about them.

In Scotland and Wales data sits with digital strategies

I’m a bit torn about whether it is desirable to see data as merely an aspect of digital. I often joke to my digital colleagues that digital is merely how we get to the data. It is the data that matters. Would I situate digital within a data strategy instead? I’m not sure. Of course UK Government has recently closed its consultation on a National Data Strategy. This was a bit high level to concern itself with tactical tools like data maturity assessments.

More data maturity is good surely?

From my perspective an increased focus on data maturity can only be a good thing. That said, there is, as so often in government, a risk of wheels being repeatedly reinvented. Our Data Maturity Framework was developed with not-for profits in England and Wales but public bodies from across the UK and beyond have used our online Data Maturity Assessment and find that it provides them with good insights into their organisations. How different will a public sector Data Maturity Framework be to a nonprofit Data Maturity Assessment?

I guess we are about to find out.