In the world of data, the tools get to blame bad workmen. As the public sector attempts to marry a smaller budget with a growing workload, the toolbox of shared data can lead the way to better services but only if used correctly by staff. Being data-driven goes deeper than bringing charts to meetings or ‘making decisions with numbers,’ it means daily decisions based on evidence even when that presents uncomfortable truths, says Scott Castle, senior Vice President of Sisence, a AI-driven platform for infusing analytics everywhere within businesses. “Don’t let your teams just search out favourable statistics – encourage them to look at the complete data picture and come to conclusions based on the preponderance of the evidence,” says Castle. “Success means implementing a hypothesis-driven culture which identifies theories, tests them, and rigorously seeks to disprove them while rapidly implementing those that show promise.”
