bmwelby's blog

Thoughts from the mind of Ben Welby

Category: Work (Page 1 of 8)

Back to work

November 19, 2024 / / 0 Comments

When I left the OECD last summer, it was for several reasons (some of them implicit in this blog post). And I’m pleased that I decided to do so. This has been such a valuable slice of time – a luxury I recognise few people are able to enjoy.

I’m so lucky to have had the career I’ve had to this point and the breadth and depth of what I’ve done. But it has given me a bit of a dilemma about the shape of who I am and the role that best fits, especially in this new, post-OECD phase.

In terms of substance, the OECD was a good match and I was fortunate to have been adept at what the job required. I’m really proud of all the work I contributed to there. But it’s also true that I missed the “gnarliness” of delivery – the practical, hands-on experience without which I wouldn’t have been as good at the job. So I always knew my time focusing on the conceptual and advisory wasn’t forever – it’s testament to the team and the content that I surprised myself and ended up staying for five years.

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Building a data-driven public sector Part 3: Unlocking the value of data without losing public trust

July 19, 2024 / / 3 Comments
This entry is part 4 of 4 in the series Building a data driven public sector (DDPS)

On 16th May 2024 I led a 90 minute session as part of the Digital Academy Masterclass, hosted by the Government of Azerbaijan’s Innovation and Digital Development Agency, and delivered by Digital Nation.

I’ve broken the presentation into 4 parts. After the introduction, Part 1 considered the potential of data to deliver public value; Part 2 looked at the elements needed to actually build a data-driven public sector; and this, Part 3, explored how to unlock the value of data without losing public trust.

Unless otherwise indicated or an obvious screenshot, the images were generated by ChatGPT.

Now we’re onto the third and final part of this morning’s session. We’ve thought about where value can come from in terms of what you do with data. We’ve thought about the role you all play in helping to create the conditions for data to be used. But now we will finish with thinking about how our use of data builds and preserves trust.

Trust is such a valuable commodity. But it can be lost so quickly and take so long to repair.

Trust between citizens and their government is the basis on which the legitimacy of public institutions is built. Without trust, some policies lose their meaning and some services cease to be used. Unfortunately, trust is deteriorating in many countries.

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Building a data-driven public sector Part 2: How to do it

July 19, 2024 / / 1 Comment
This entry is part 3 of 4 in the series Building a data driven public sector (DDPS)

On 16th May 2024 I led a 90 minute session as part of the Digital Academy Masterclass, hosted by the Government of Azerbaijan’s Innovation and Digital Development Agency, and delivered by Digital Nation.

I’ve broken the presentation into 4 parts. After the introduction, Part 1 considered the potential of data to deliver public value; this is Part 2 and looked at the elements needed to actually build a data-driven public sector; and Part 3 explored how to unlock the value of data without losing public trust.

Unless otherwise indicated or an obvious screenshot, the images were generated by ChatGPT.

David McCandless, of Information is Beautiful, suggested that instead of thinking about data like oil, we should rather think of it like soil. Data is a fertile environment from which good things might happen. 

But just like soil, it is something you have to nurture and care for if you want it to give you a good return.

And this is where we start our second section – if we’re in roles with responsibility for building a data-driven public sector then we need to think about our job in terms of farming. We need to be mindful that when it comes to data our job is to make good soil and nurture data-driven ways of working.

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Building a data-driven public sector Introduction

July 19, 2024 / / 1 Comment
This entry is part 1 of 4 in the series Building a data driven public sector (DDPS)

On 16th May 2024 I led a 90 minute session as part of the Digital Academy Masterclass, hosted by the Government of Azerbaijan’s Innovation and Digital Development Agency, and delivered by Digital Nation.

I’ve broken the presentation into 4 parts. This is the introduction, Part 1 considered the potential of data to deliver public value; Part 2 looked at the elements needed to actually build a data-driven public sector; and Part 3 explored how to unlock the value of data without losing public trust.

Unless otherwise indicated or an obvious screenshot, the images were generated by ChatGPT.

My name’s Ben Welby and I’ve spent 15 years working in and around digital transformation starting off in local government, then helping to build and launch GOV.UK, and most recently at the OECD.

Today we’re going to be looking at the three aspects of building a data-driven public sector:

Can Labour unlock the value of the OECD?

July 11, 2024 / / 3 Comments

Rachel Reeves has been quick to tell us that UK public finances are in their worst state since World War Two. As she pores over the bank statements to identify a subscription or two to cancel she might pause at the £900,0001 we send each month to the OECD and ask what are we getting for that money.2

I hope she and the Cabinet get a handle on that a bit more quickly than their predecessors. In the summer of 2023 the UK Foreign Secretary was in Paris, chairing the OECD’s annual meeting of ministers. He gave a speech that basically said “Before this week I didn’t appreciate the breadth and value of the OECD”. Arguably, he was just praising the organisation with niceties but then again, the ministerial musical chairs of the last decade means it’s not wholly surprising if the value and scope of the OECD got a bit lost.

It’s easily done.

OECD data does crop up from time to time but neither UK politicians or UK media seem to pay too much attention to its work. Just this week the OECD published the latest edition of its Trust Survey. In Ireland there was a ministerial press release and some press coverage but in the UK, nothing. And yet there’s a huge amount to unpack from what it says (and what it doesn’t) including the headline that only 2 of the surveyed countries have lower levels of trust in national government than the UK3.

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Five things I think about GDS, CDDO and i.AI moving into DSIT

July 10, 2024 / / 5 Comments

If those acronyms mean nothing to you then this blog post is not for you. It’s written in response to the news that the Government Digital Service (GDS) and the Central Digital and Data Office (CDDO), and the Incubator for Artificial Intelligence (i.AI) are moving from the Cabinet Office to the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) under the responsibility of Peter Kyle as the responsible minister.

At the OECD one of the things we would emphasise was the importance of a mandate and authority for providing leadership of digital government across the entire public sector. GDS was the poster child for this idea. Many countries have established their own Digital Government Units similarly located at the centre of government and operating in proximity to the country’s political leadership. In more than one country the digital function has been given even more prominence and made an extension of the President or the Prime Minister. This has been critical in ensuring that the agenda receives support at the highest levels and made a priority.

In the UK, GDS benefitted from Francis Maude as the Minister for Cabinet Office (MCO) with his leadership backing the wave of transformation through to 2015. Under his watch many of the things that established the culture for digital transformation bedded in. And then in 2015 there started a sequence of 12 MCOs in 9 years. Not many of them showed the same aptitude for leading digital transformation as Maude.

Along the way the clarity of responsibility for digital started to fray. Digital inclusion, some aspects of data, some parts of Artificial Intelligence, and some parts of digital identity moving over to what is now DSIT.

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Re: The oddness of the political moment

July 9, 2024 / / 3 Comments

At the start of June, James Plunkett wrote a piece called The oddness of the political moment. It is amazing just quite how quickly the atmosphere has changed since the election (I’d attribute a lot of how I feel myself to having prayed through Croydon and then for all 650 MPs in the last week) but the post remains very timely and insightful.

I left a couple of comments around accountability. One on the accountability of those elected to serve, and the other about GOV.UK and the policymaking process. David Durant said one needed to be a blog post, but I’ve done both.

1. Accountability of politicians

“…it seems increasingly clear we need people whose day job it is to care about the infrastructure that underpins accountability and the associated discourse…”

The oddness of the political moment, James Plunkett (07/06/2024)

When I decided to leave the OECD, a major factor was the stark disconnect between its stated mission of ‘better policies for better lives’ and the practical reality that means the organisation has to prioritise diplomatic niceties over accountability. I accept that my expectations are perhaps unreasonable. After all, the OECD isn’t an organisation designed, set up or mandated to provide accountability when a member mis-steps. However, you can’t have a ‘rules based international order’ if there’s no accountability against those rules.

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