Going further, faster.
At a glance
- With limited resources and lots of customer-facing services, DVSA must invest in the right data to ensure they can promote and ensure safe drivers and vehicles.
- However, DVSA had been measuring data in terms of cost and risk rather than value, so needed to know the data that mattered most to their customers and the UK economy.
- DVSA now know the value and maturity of their data assets, helping them have informed conversations about the importance of data for customer outcomes, which data matters most, and how to fix it.
Who are DVSA?
What was the problem?
When Shirley Harding and Chris Barnes first approached us, they wanted to help DVSA unleash the power of technology and data. But Shirley and Chris were aware of their constraints.
To make that vision a reality, they knew they needed to make as much impact as possible with the limited resources available.
Chris realised that “When you don’t have an infinite budget, it’s imperative to have a measure of why one business case is a priority over another.”
Data was compartmentalised into specific functions, preventing valuable data spreading across the organisation and often leading to costly data rework and duplication.
Whilst people in DVSA knew data was important, they struggled to communicate why and how their data was part of a bigger system.
The data team wanted to demonstrate the need for an organisation-wide approach, showing the crucial dependency between successful service delivery and fit for purpose data.
“We have hundreds of customer-facing digital services that all need data, but we didn’t know which are most valuable to our customers, and the data that they rely upon” Chris reflected.
At the time, DVSA didn’t have a line-of-sight between specific data assets and the activities and outcomes they enabled. This had created a defensive mindset, where the focus was on how poor data created information risk rather than business and customer risk.
Business cases for data were measured by the internal efficiencies they generated, like saving money on software licenses, and not by value to the customer.
How did we help?
Understanding the value of data for DVSA was not about putting a price tag on their data with a view to selling it. The purpose of valuing data in a government agency like DVSA is to provide a common language and understanding around how data drives service delivery and which data matters. This helps people have informed conversations around data management and investment.
With this in mind, we focussed on the value DVSA’s Enforcement function creates for the economy, rather than commercial revenue generation, and the data that enabled that value. We calculated that DVSA’s enforcement activities create £1.3bn for the UK economy, each year, by preventing accidents on UK roads.
To connect this functional-level valuation to data, we conducted a data valuation and a data maturity assessment.
We used our tried and tested data maturity survey with 100+ respondents, 236 questions and 14,000 data points, to understand the perspectives of DVSA employees on how the agency manages its data.
It captures pain-points and needs, provides an agency-wide view of data management, and gives early warnings of potential issues.
We valued each of DVSA’s data assets based on the degree that it supported DVSA’s goals.
We conducted interviews with key people working at DVSA, to determine what activities drive the most value, how important data is to each of those activities, and which data assets are most important to those activities.
What were the results?
With a new and clearer understanding of their data landscape, DVSA can now have more conversations with the business about their data.
Here are the key outcomes of the project:
By combining the valuation and maturity assessment, we identified high-value, low-maturity data assets that will help DVSA unlock enormous value for the UK economy.
“The work done has really given us the evidence to know what our priorities are”, said Shirley.
DVSA now know how data enables service delivery, which data is most important to them and their customers, and what capabilities they need to deliver maximum data value.
When we’re in a room talking about priorities and financial expenditure, I think people are starting to realise that there is an opportunity to bring data into the world of finance and business cases.”
What was it like working with Anmut?
It was very open and if there was any uncertainty, I could always bring it up and ask questions. The ease of engagement went a long way!”
Ready to discover your data landscape?
A successful data organisation is built on a well-understood data landscape.
It gives you the visibility into the data you have, how mature it is, and how it’s used in your organisation.
Without this foundation, you’re taking shots in the dark. With it, you have the evidence you need to apply focussed, performance-driven changes to your data management practices. Unlocking massive efficiency gains and value.
Contact us, to discover how we can help you with the performance of your data.