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A Blueprint and Implementation of a Public Data Ecosystem
Overview
The open data movement is gaining more momentum and is based on the assumption that more intensive and creative use of information and technology can improve policy-making and generate new forms of public value. Making data available for public use promotes transparency and accountability, economic development and expanded networks for knowledge creation. Past efforts in making data public has resulted in data being published in an ad-hoc manner, often through grass-roots efforts, with little consideration of access management, accountability or analytics. Consumers of public data want assurance that the data collection, management, access and dissemination practices used result in data provided that is valid, sufficient and appropriate for policy analysis or any other use. Data publishers must adhere to lifecycle processes in order to assure that the data accurate but is also fit for use considering both subjective perceptions and objective assessments which will have a bearing on the extent to which users are willing and able to use information. A systematic approach with an enterprise lifecycle perspective must be used to enable the full potential of open data. The most effective open data ecosystem produces benefits for the data consumer and the data provider but requires a structured, governed approach for supporting open data use. A civic effort in Minnesota has created a blueprint that addresses the strategy, design, deployment, operation and continual improvement of a public storefront to publish, discover, govern and manage publicly available data.
Summary: There are many social and economic benefits to making data available for public use, including transparency, accountability, economic development, and knowledge creation. The most effective system for publishing and delivering data requires a structured, governed approach designed from a lifecycle perspective for supporting data use.
Business Value and Return on Investment
The business value and return on investment of making public data available cannot be quantified in quantitative terms. A business makes decisions on the basis of quantifiable information that is used to develop a return on investment (ROI). If the ROI is within range of investment criteria, the decision to invest is easier to make. When it comes to making data open, the question for the government domain to answer is what is the cost of doing so and what is the expected business value since ROI cannot be determined in quantifiable terms. The value proposition of open data is associated with: 1) transparency and accountability, 2) economic development and smart disclosure, and 3) expanded policy networks for knowledge creation. A McKinsey report [1] expands on an important topic contained in a prior report[2] by McKinsey, which suggests that government can promote open data, and participates in over $3 trillion in economic value. Value creation can be enabled through promoting better decision making (more information results in better decisions), stimulating development of new products and services, and increasing transparency and improving accountability. Alex Howard[3] has discussed how open government promotes transparency and accountability, which is at the core of how government is thought about. When budgets are constrained, government officials question the value of each spending decision. Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web, has said that increased transparency into a state’s finances and services directly relates to the willingness of businesses and other nations to invest in that government entity. The business value of open government is not always clear especially with respect to investment or outcomes. “Reactive” or “proactive” disclosure of information will affect the proliferation of data made available through public means. Reactive disclosure means that a question needs to be asked before an answer is given[4] while proactive disclosure is the release of information before it is requested. Open data policies and laws provide an opportunity not just to update and improve access to information that is already available but to specify that new data sets and records be published in a proactive manner hence influencing the use of data for public and business decisions. These open data efforts must be funded, however, and compete for budget dollars that may have greater public benefit than just simply the release of publicly available open data.
The challenges with releasing public data, in order to capitalize on perceived business value, require that effort be put into a comprehensive effort to manage, govern and make available public information and that a more systematic and structured approach should be considered in order to realize the potential business value of making public data available. The process of cleaning and preparing data to be published has returns for workers inside government itself and should be considered. A McKinsey[5] report indicates that government workers spend 19% of their time looking for information. The process of opening up public data clearly has benefits (and business value) for both external and internal users of this data.
What is the business value for a government domain to spend resources on opening up public data? There will be value for constituents (individual and commercial) who make use of the data to promote public or societal awareness and who develop commercial applications that are used for commercial purposes. The value to the government entity making the data available can have political, societal, and economic benefits. Users of the data can be important indicators of business activity and provide analytics to government entities to gain more insight into potential future economic value.
What data is made available and how to make it available are important parameters that need to be addressed in any public data initiative. In this sense, it is worthwhile to look at the delivery of open data to public consumers as a lifecycle process where data creation, data quality, data availability and data governance are key to assuring users that a rigorous enterprise approach to delivering data is in place making them more comfortable with the use and long term availability of the data.
Summary: There is great value generated by making public data available; in the U.S there is an estimated annual economic benefit of $1.1 trillion, due in part to increased efficiency and development of new products and services. Benefits can be difficult if not impossible to quantify directly as a return on investment and instead are better visualized as a value-add to constituents, governments, and companies; additionally, changing existing systems that are staff-time intensive (such as Data Practices Act requests) can reduce costs.
Government Domains
Governments collect or generate much data for their own purposes or from their own operations. If governments did not gain a net benefit from collecting and using data, they would not collect it to begin with. The U.S. Federal government has taken a lead in making open data available to the public. It recognizes information as a valuable national resource and a strategic asset to the Federal Government, its partners and the public. Its stated goals are to manage information as an asset throughout its life cycle to promote openness and interoperability and properly safeguard systems and information. Managing government information as an asset is expected to increase operational efficiencies, reduce costs, improve services, support mission needs, safeguard personal information and increase public access to valuable government information[6]. For example, the Federal Government website, data.gov, currently (September, 2014) has 108,498 data sets available on the data.gov portal.
The Federal Government has more resources available to it to invest in the development and delivery of an open data portal. Any government domain has the ability to gain value from making public data open and available but may not have the financial resources to invest in the infrastructure resources to make it available. To that extent, it is likely that smaller government domains may need to take advantage of larger domains that do have the ability to invest in open data initiatives.
All government domains, including federal, state, regional, county and city governments, should consider making their data available to the public. Because of the initial costs of making data available, not all entities will be able to make their data available. Funding may not be available at all because of the initial costs of a portal that will make the open data available to the public. To reduce the costs of providing open data to the public, small governments (e.g., small cities) could mutualize their expenses with other smaller entities or rely on other larger government infrastructure provided to share public data.
Summary: Governments can capture many benefits by making their data open, including: increased efficiency, reduced costs, improved services, support of their mission, and safeguarding of systems and information. It should be acknowledged that financial resources will be required to make data openly available, but a systematic view of costs for the existing system should be considered along with estimates of these benefits to the government and its constituents.
References
[1] McKinsey Global Institute, “How Government can Promote Open Data and Help Unleash over $3 Trillion in Economic Value”, Government Designed for New Times, 2013.
[2] McKinsey Global Institute, “Open data: Unlocking innovation and performance with liquid information”,http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/business_technology/open_data_unlocking_innovation_and_performance_with_liquid_information, October 2013.
[3] Howard, A., “What is the ROI of open government?”, http://gov20.govfresh.com/what-is-the-roi-of-open-government/, March 2013.
[4] Sunlight Foundation, “Open Data Guidelines”, http://sunlightfoundation.com/opendataguidelines/.
[5]McKinsey Global Institute, “The social economy: Unlocking value and productivity through social technologies”, http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/high_tech_telecoms_internet/the_social_economy, July 2012. [6] Burwell, S.M., VanRoekel, S., Park, T., and Mancini, D.J., “M-13-13 - Memorandum for the Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies”, http://project-open-data.github.io/policy-memo/.
