Empowering APAC Public Sector CDOs To Take Governance to the Next Level With Data
COVID-19 has put the world through a trial by fire. While the private sector has adapted quickly and successfully to the disrupted landscape, the journey for the public sector isn't as straightforward. Governments, especially in Asia-Pacific (APAC), continue to face numerous challenges as they delicately balance fending off new mutant strains of the virus with reopening their economies and societies safely.
While public sector decisions drive a nation's COVID-19 resilience, as seen by Singapore snatching the top spot from New Zealand in Bloomberg's ranking last month, one universal helper has emerged to boost government performance during COVID-19 and beyond: data. It was apt for Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the World Health Organization’s director-general, to say that we are not just fighting a pandemic. We are also fighting an infodemic – and the public sector needs a lot of data to build public trust, design the right policies and make better decisions for its citizens.
However, this need to analyze and act on large datasets has unveiled some shortfalls in the public sector's digital strategies. A new Qlik and Omdia study, "Emergence of the Public Sector Chief Data Officer in APAC", revealed that APAC public sector organizations have yet to adjust to a post-pandemic landscape marked by digital transformation. 75% of APAC CDOs (Chief Data Officers) surveyed regretted not having invested more in data-driven initiatives before the pandemic hit, potentially impacting their ability to use technology to develop better citizen services.
Creating a robust data culture – an organizational culture that can collect, interpret, and use data with the help of cutting-edge cloud services like artificial intelligence and machine learning – has become imperative for public sector organizations. To determine the appropriate steps to encourage a robust data culture, we first need to identify the broader matter at hand.
Who are APAC public sector CDOs, anyway?
The public sector CDO is an emerging role within APAC. Government leaders in APAC still lack sufficient understanding of data's value in driving policy development and decision-making. Even if some APAC government agencies acknowledge data as a valuable core asset, our study found that two in five data executives (47%) lack clarity in their roles and responsibilities. Despite possessing a wealth of prior experience in the broader government sector, these executives are relatively new to the CDO function, with 57% of CDOs having less than two years of experience in that role.
The public sector CDO is an emerging role within APAC. The slate is clean, and it's up to CDOs to define who they want to be. I have observed how CDOs are no longer just digital shepherds but instigators for an 'offensive' data strategy to drive innovation. The data deluge, which is the biggest in APAC, makes CDOs perfect change-makers as no other chief executive can better grasp today's data opportunities. But developing a data-driven culture is no easy feat and cannot be managed alone. 62% of CDOs felt leadership support is crucial in helping them perform in their role and would like to see more.
Stepping up data governance
As APAC public sector CDOs settle into their role, many find themselves tasked with enabling open government data initiatives. Open government data projects aim to improve public service by making data available to trusted third parties for developing citizen services. In New Zealand and Singapore, free online tools developed with open data from the government have greatly helped citizens, from finding the right schools to identifying affordable neighborhoods.
Key to the success of such projects is data governance, the best practices framework that provides the public sector workforce with on-demand, governed access to a single source of trusted, analytics-ready data. Despite clear proof of data governance's role in making data projects a success, strengthening management support, and building broader awareness of the value of data in decision-making, almost two thirds (62%) of APAC public sector organizations have not created a data governance body.
United States (US) public sector organizations are doing a better job here than their APAC counterparts, with 71% seeing data governance as a priority for realizing data's full potential, compared to only 36% in APAC. This disparity in data governance may stem from the fact that US legislation has long defined the CDO's role and highlighted data's value in driving policy development amongst government leaders, which isn't the case in APAC just yet.
Three steps to a data-driven public sector organization in APAC
The answer to helping the APAC region accelerate its data governance and leadership support for CDOs is a potent combination of data literacy, data technology, and data strategy.
Increase data literacy as a corporate priority. The ability to read, work with, analyze, and communicate with data has become an essential skill that empowers all levels of the public service to build knowledge, make decisions, and share data's meaning to others. Data literacy is crucial for strengthening data governance and a workforce's data capabilities, helping public sector agencies gain a deep, well-rounded understanding of policy issues and opportunities, and enable governments to solve more meaningful citizens challenges.
Community resources, including those offered by The Data Literacy Project, can help the public sector workforce get started. Last year, Qlik collaborated with Singapore's GovTech to provide public officers with access to a wealth of learning resources, industry best practices, and the latest development tools to enhance data literacy, helping Singapore groom a digitally ready workforce and transforming its public service to be data-driven and citizen-centric.
Critically review the public sector agency's existing technology investment. The rise of data volumes and complexity to accommodate the non-stop creation of new technologies, and vice versa, is a never-ending virtuous loop. To keep up, CDOs, along with their CIO counterpart, must review the organization’s existing technology investment to ensure that it is suitable to meet the current and emerging requirements of today's evolving digital climate. CDOs cited analytics and business intelligence technology as the top resourcing priority (73%) to enable data use within their organizations and voiced technical and strategic concerns for implementing data technology, including integrating data and finding the right technology partner.
Treat data as a strategy, not an afterthought. Data initiatives will become more strategic and outcome-focused as APAC public sector organizations reposition themselves beyond COVID-19 in the next year. Agencies should analyze the lessons learnt during the pandemic, including implementing crisis management, business continuity, and remote working, to create better data strategies. Avoid losing these lessons in the recovery stage by integrating them tightly with business-as-usual management practices and agency-wide strategic plans.
Citizen-centric services of the future
COVID-19 has prompted APAC governments to use data insights to create better citizen services. CDOs must help their organizations understand data's value by defining their CDO role, reassessing the agency's technology investments, and creating a data-literate culture that enables employees to act on it. With these steps in motion, CDOs enable a suitable public sector data strategy to meet the new normal's emerging agility and innovation requirements, realize data-driven decision-making, and transform public sector entities into proactive citizen-focused organizations.
Charlie Farah, director of Industry Solutions for Healthcare and Public Sector at Qlik wrote this article.
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of CDOTrends. Image credit: iStockphoto/masterzphotois
