Improvements to the governance and dissemination process of

StatLine, at Statistics Netherlands

Drs. Ran van den Boom

Statistics Netherlands

May 13-15, 2008

Starting-points, principles

1. All figures from Statistics Netherlands (SN) should be published on StatLine, the one-and-only database with all SN tables

Special requirements for organisation and IT

2. SN aims at everyone in The Netherlands and more

The level of visitors varies significantly We also aim at non-visitors

Starting-points, principles

3. Budget reductions and tackling administrative burdens (red tape) makes Public Relations (PR) for SN important

One of the means for PR is StatLine, the database of all statistics of SN

4. Earlier improvements (StatLine 4) did not succeed

Complexity was too large: new process, migration of meta and data, new database format, new software for complete process, coordination of terms at a high level in 1 project

Amongst the solutions

1. StatLine CoOP– Improve quality and efficiency– Improve accessibility– Make sure software is working up to 2012– Lessons learned from StatLine 4

2. PR through Statistics– Other visualisations– Dedicated websites

Improve quality, efficiency and accessibility

StatLine CoOP programme– Achieving Coordination level 1

Improve comprehensibility and uniformity of the statistics: quality

– Improving the Output (dissemination) processRedesign governance of the communication and the

dissemination process along with the tools: efficiency

– Improving the Presentation of statisticsRevise layer around the StatLine database (StatWeb

5) to make it more user-friendly: accessibility

CoOP stands for CooperationWithout it, we would not be successful

Achieving Coordination level 1 Problems

Problems for understanding table explanations– Abbreviations– Officialise, difficult, solemn and old-fashioned

words– Technical words– Statistical terms

Quality attention and procedures were focused on paper articles, webarticles; not on StatLine tables

Dissemination department served as Quality Police

Quality

Coordination levelsBackground: Model for levels of coordination

Level Meaning

1 All figures have a clear and correct label and explanation

2 Equal terms = equal definitions and vice versa

3 Relations between terms are defined

4 Standardisation of terms, preference for these terms

5 Standardisation of terms in tables, embargo on other terms

6 Consistent data between different tables

7 Combined tables

Quality

Achieving coordination level 1Project approach

– Facilitated by• Guidelines (level of audience = newsviewers)• Tools• Communication, newsletters each month, open

meetings• Overviews of parts of metadata such as titles• Strong cooperation with the seven statistical

departments, dissemination department, project team; bottom-up approach

• Awarding best effort with a pie each week– To reach level 1 was (and is) difficult: a lot of

stakeholders, communication, discussions

Quality

Achieving coordination level 1Project results

– 900 tables for which text was reviewed, improved and placed in 6 months time

– Better explanations– Hardly any abbreviations– More awareness for quality– New, supported, guidelines– Reference texts– Previewing a table before publication– Overview of meta in StatLine available

Quality

Achieving coordination level 1Goals not met

– Explanations sometimes too large– Guidelines not completely applied– Some inconsistencies still remain– Some statistical departments still busy as a

result of other priorities and being understaffed– Tools less successful

Challenge:

How to keep the focus and attention for quality? And how to improve quality?

Quality

Improving the Output (dissemination) process

Reasons to improve the process• Data was stored in > 10 places

• Inconsistencies appeared

• Administration cumbersome

• Uploading data to the website sometimes took too long

• Problems maintaining the software in the near future

Efficiency

Organisation of dissemination at SN

Efficiency

General Director

Communication

3 Divisions

7 Statisticaldepartmentsdealing withdissemination

Otherdepartments

Disseminationdepartment

StatLineWebsiteYearbookStatistical outputInt. courses

PRMagazineExt. courses

Improving the process; approach

1. Quick-wins without adapting the process• Preview of the adapted or new table

• Easier administration

• Copying deltas to Internet instead of all data

2. Long term improvements• New governance model

• New process, less steps

• New roles, quality checks at the beginning

• New and adapted tooling, only one administration and a minimum number of table storage locations

Efficiency

The new process

Design and build meta

Announce table and meta (PR & administration)

Build the table and store

Preview

Check, report ready

Check against guidelines

Final preview and check by head of department, report ready, publish automatically

Efficiency

DisseminationDepartment

StatisticalDepartments

End responsibility for quality

Challenges in implementing new governance model

People, responsibilities, roles– How to help them change?

Process, procedures– How to make it acceptable for all?

Organisation– How to change management?

Facilitating, templates, tools– How to organise without much budget, resources,

time?

We’re still busy, using lessons learned, Agile techniques, colour theory (De Caluwé), Prince2, and communication

Efficiency

Improving the Presentation of statistics

StatWeb 5 improvements– Part of the overall website– Icons, colours and layout have a modern looking

web application– Improves navigation and adds more explanations for

inexperienced users– Replaced the Java applet with a more commonly

available JavaScript/HTML solution– Performance and scalability– And more…

Accessibility

StatWeb 5 Entrance

Accessibility

StatWeb 5 ExampleClear what icons doExplanation

Change the selection

Accessibility

PR through Statistics

1. Several “special” dedicated websites:– Youth monitor (Jeugdmonitor – Dutch only)– CBS in your neighbourhood (CBS in uw buurt –

Dutch only)– Under development: CBS for companies and

organisations– Under investigation: StatLine maps

2. Visualisations, such as Business Cycle clock

3. Google maps

4. Google earth (English and Dutch)

5. Under investigation: banners (using webservices)

Youth monitor

Currently StatWeb 3 underneath

Plans to migrate to webservices and StatWeb 5

CBS in your neighbourhood

Uses Google Maps

Google Earth

StatLine

Coverage versus levelA rough indication;

Gaps to bridge? By us?

Press messages

Coverage of all details of all statistics

Level ofaudience,ease ofunderstanding

Googlemaps

Googleearth

BannersLinks

SN Website

Dedicated sites

Mic

roda

ta

Lessons learned: Things to do

Involvement of the management

Involvement of the end-user

Experienced team leaders

Focus on most important goal

Communication is two-ways

Bottom-up approach

Pro-active on risks

Guidelines, tools ready at the beginning

Improving quality and efficiency requiresmore than just guidelines

Thank you

Discussion, questions

– Does this process and organisation fit?– Would a “Quality Police” still be required?– How to keep attention on quality?– How to increase quality?– Would the results of Achieving level 1 have

been better if:– Each table was reviewed after it was improved? – The statistical departments could have been

“ordered” to spend more time on quality? At what costs?