What is a Centre for Data Analytics?
Nesta, one of the UK’s leading innovation foundations, defines a Data Institute (or Office of Data Analytics) as:
- A model for multiple organisations to join up, analyse and act upon data sourced from multiple public sector bodies to improve services and make better decisions.
- Ultimately, they create multi-organisational, actionable insight from otherwise siloed information.
The digital revolution has brought with it an explosion of data, and the public sector is arguably one of the largest producers of data. Data offers us significant potential to help tackle the complex, system-wide, social challenges we are seeing locally and across the UK, and locally. More efficient sharing and utilising of our data offers the opportunity to transform outcomes and realise benefits across Staffordshire.
Whilst the public sector is a large producer of data, we are often insight poor. We collect a myriad of data across Staffordshire on a daily basis, stored in a variety of systems, with significant potential to help us to get upstream to prevent needs escalating and target interventions. The ultimate aim of the SCDA is to improve outcomes and increase efficiency.
In many public sector organisations in Staffordshire, there is a recognition that there is a need to strengthen and invest in its data science and analytical capability. However, investing in system-wide, joint capability and capacity offers greater potential benefits and opportunities.