Data Orchard’s 2021-22 year in review

 
 

Sian Basker, Co-Chief Executive

Last month, I wrote a blog about the Big Annual Data Challenge Every Leader Loves and Dreads. Like many CEOs, I’d been busy writing our Annual Report for our AGM, reflecting on how far we’ve come, what we’d achieved, and of course, where next for Data Orchard? (If you’re a leader pondering such things, do come along on 16th November to our CEO panel discussion on The Joy and Pain of Data: A CEO’s perspective).   

I wanted to share some of the highlights that have made me a) enormously appreciative of the forward-looking charities, social enterprises, social housing providers and public sector organisations we’ve had the opportunity to work with; and b) tremendously proud of our team for all the amazing work they do.  

Our busiest year yet 

2021-22 was Data Orchard’s busiest year yet. We worked with more people and more organisations than ever before. And, given the challenges of Covid and the subsequent cost of living crisis, the support to enable not-for-profit organisations to make use of data for better decisions and greater impact – who often provide essential services to people in need –felt more important than ever. 

We worked on 43 projects with 37 different clients. And, for the first time ever, we worked in all four nations of the United Kingdom. We also continued to work nationally and internationally, to raise awareness about the value and importance of data for social, environmental and/or community benefit. 

Highlights of the year 

Highlights of the year, across our five key service areas, were:  

Enabling organisations to get good data 

We delivered fourteen research and analysis projects enabling organisations to get good data for decision making, service design and delivery, learning, and impact evaluation. 

  • Mapping food poverty risk (in Shropshire and in Worthing) and analysing a community consultation on food poverty in a London borough. 

  • Evaluating a programme to support unemployed people to overcome barriers to employment (involving 23 voluntary organisations, across three West Midlands counties). 

  • Creating a taxonomy for climate and ecological action and analysing grants data for a major grant-maker. 

  • Building a dashboard for an education charity to monitor education and life skills outcomes for students. 

  • User and technical research on how Transport for Wales can deliver Welsh-language digital mapping. 

Educating organisations about data maturity and helping them focus on improvement 

Take up of our Data Maturity Assessment tool for the not-for-profit sector continued to grow. In addition to our free version for very small organisations, the customisable organisation tool and cohort version was used by all kinds of charities, public sector organisations and partners. For example: 

  • Prostate Cancer UK and Kent County Council (one of the largest local authorities in the UK) both conducted a data maturity assessments in their organisations, as part of their data strategy development process. 

  • Scottish Government assessed the data maturity of a cohort of public sector organisations (and are now doing so again with a second cohort). 

  • We re-assessed the data maturity of a cohort of organisations completing the DataWise programme with Superhighways, to evidence progress on their journeys. 

With over 4000 users from over 600 validated organisations, we have been able carry out sector level analysis about data maturity. Following the success of our first ever ‘State of the Sector: Data Maturity in the Not-for-Profit Sector Report’ in July 2021, we’ve begun publishing these annually. (See our second State of the Sector Data Maturity Report.)  

Excitingly the impact evaluation highlights the assessment’s effectiveness as a tool for learning and a catalyst for action.  Around half the users in our follow-up user survey said they go on to develop data improvement plans and many of those successfully secure resources to implement changes. Ultimately, these are showing benefits in better services and products, and strengthened internal capabilities, like decision making and impact.    

Behind the scenes we continue to invest in improvements to the tool and our model of data maturity. For example in January 2022 we published a revised version (2.1) of our Data Maturity Framework. 

Supporting organisations to plan and implement data strategies to improve 

We supported six organisations to develop, improve and in some cases, implement, data strategies. Examples of these include: 

  • Designing and delivering data needs workshops with staff at Blue Cross, assessing data skills and team structure, and recommending improvements to their data strategy. 

Helping organisations define and measure their impact 

We supported and trained three organisations in impact measurement in 2021-22. These included: 

  • A two year project with The New Model Institute for Technology and Engineering (NMITE) to develop a framework and plan for impact measurement. This involved engaging senior staff and board to develop their theory of change, designing an evaluation framework, defining and gathering baseline measures, and key reporting metrics, data mapping with staff, and producing an action plan for implementation.  

Building data skills and knowledge  

One of Data Orchard’s aims is to build data skills and capabilities. In 2021-22 we delivered and participated in over 60 events, engaging approximately 2,000 people in exploring, learning, and talking about data. Examples of our achievements include: 

  • Online workshops with our clients, directly engaging hundreds of people (mostly staff, senior managers, and leaders) in learning about data and analytics, data maturity, data strategy, and/or impact measurement. 

  • Our work with DataBasic Cymru ensured that Welsh language training resources and datasets, tailored to the Welsh context, were made available to Welsh organisations. Since then, local authorities across Wales have been putting cohorts of staff through data fluency training using these materials. 

  • We worked with Y-Lab to support the development of the curriculum for the ‘data’ strand of a new project, designed to introduce council staff from the Capital City Region in Wales to new skills, methods and tools that improve their capacity and capability to innovate. 

  • We’ve continued to publish a wide range of free resources to help engage, enthuse and empower people in the not-for-profit sector with knowledge about the power of data. These include our free monthly newsletter, blogs, tools & resources, and events programme. 

Our Impact 

Our mission is to enable organisations to use data for better decisions and greater impact. We are encouraged by feedback from our clients which suggests we are achieving this, particularly in relation to informing future planning and strategy.  This year we’ve reviewed the longer-term outcomes for some of our past work.  Many have gone on to implement changes in their organisations, creating new roles and jobs, improving the quality and availability of their data, adopting new tools and systems, implementing staff training programmes, embracing data as part of their core strategies and planning cycles. Some of the training materials and curriculums we’ve designed, have since been rolled out by our clients enabling hundreds of people to gain data knowledge and skills (especially in the public sector in Wales).   

A few examples of those continued journeys after our support include: 

  • Four years after we started working with The Cart Shed (and three years since we finished our work with them) the organisation is now seeing data and analytics influence a range of service areas.  The benefits and rewards are starting to be seen most extensively around evidencing needs/problems of their service users, client outcomes, and evidencing their own impact to stakeholders.  Other areas where benefits are being seen are in targeting services, reach and engagement, and service design and delivery. You can read the reflections on The Cart Shed’s four year data maturity journey here 

  • Liverpool Lighthouse went on to develop a new strategic plan based on the theory of change and impact ambition we developed with them. In early 2022 they re-launched as a ‘Creative sanctuary’ -  focusing on arts and wellbeing with the aim of building a thriving community of people living more fulfilled lives. In terms of data there have been practical changes too. They’ve standardised the data they collect, including outcomes data, adopted a centralised data management system,  have someone managing it and engaging with staff to keep it updated.  Read the full story of Liverpool Lighthouse’s journey here.  

  • Our data maturity assessment played an important role in bringing people together to plan a data strategy for the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy. Dr Jenny Andrew Head of Data Strategy fed back on the incredible change taking place in their organisation since then: Data Maturity at the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy. 

Influencing Government 

Influencing government has also been a success of 2021-22. The UK Government has used our data maturity framework as the basis for developing their own government data maturity framework.  Welsh Government and Transport for Wales have adopted Welsh language mapping using our datasets and recommendations. The Charity Commission has listened to our perspective (along with those of other key stakeholders) and intends to change the data it collects as a regulator. A public consultation on the proposed changes has recently been completed and we await news on the next steps. 

Growing and changing for the future 

We continue to grow and renew as an organisation. In January 2022 we were delighted to welcome two new analysts to the Data Orchard team. We said fond farewells to some great people who had supported us on our journey and we look forward to bringing some new faces to our board in the coming months. 

We’re currently reviewing our impact to date and exploring options for the future direction of Data Orchard. So, we’ll be busy preparing to set course for our next strategy period for 2023-26.  Watch this space! 

We hope you’ll continue to take an interest in our work, and we’d love to hear from you, if you have ideas to contribute or feedback. 

 
 
Sian BaskerData4good, data skills