Goodbye to DataKind UK founding volunteer and board member, Fran Bennett

After seven years of service to DataKind UK — as co-founder of the UK chapter, and trustee of the charity since then — Fran Bennett is stepping down. Here are her reflections on the evolution of data for good in the UK, and what comes next for social sector data use.

In the early 2010s, ‘big data’ was still a cool, new concept with a dozen different definitions, and data science was even newer and cooler. While it was a lot of fun playing around with these new tools and ideas, many of us were also wondering: if the hype about this field came true, then surely we ought to be seeing how to apply it to social change as well.

At the time this broad idea was all we had: the thought that we ought to connect the dots between the nascent data science scene; a notoriously knotty, complicated, and changing set of social problems; and the often badly under-resourced, rarely technically sophisticated organisations that were tackling them.

In the US, there was a new nonprofit called DataKind, which was trying to figure out how to make that exact connection between data and social good. We wanted to build something like that in the UK, although we also knew that we weren’t going to be identical.

The institutions, ideas, and ways of doing things are subtly different between our two nations, although most of the social issues we’re trying to tackle are the same. So we set up a DataKind UK charity with the same mission as DataKind USA, but with its own theory of change. We’ve worked together ever since to try and figure out how to best put data and its techniques to work in order to help social sector organisations achieve their missions.

We’ve learned quite a few things along the way, and we know there’s a lot more to do. I’m sad to be moving on from DataKind UK, but so excited to be leaving it in such a strong position. We’ve learned and we’ve done loads, and there’s still plenty more ahead.

Here are my reflections from our time using data science for good. These are hard-earned but important learnings, over the seven years since we started DataKind UK. Though they might seem obvious now, they certainly weren’t back then.

• Though it’s tempting to apply a thin layer of data and tech over the top of existing organisational practices, it’s not effective. We spent a lot of time building solutions which didn’t last, or were an answer in search of a problem, without getting to the heart of the change that was needed. We eventually realised that we needed to spend a lot of time working with organisations on their data maturity — and one of the most important things we could do was to have a clear model of what maturity might look like, and to set up a whole pipeline of support to help the organisations who wanted and needed it along the way. Hackathons are glamorous, but ‘office hours’ support working on the basics is where a lot of the real impact is unlocked.
• The data volunteer community is large, wonderful, motivated, and super smart. All we needed to do was provide the structures and opportunities to unlock that talent — we didn’t have to do much at all to find keen people or to enthuse them about data for good. Everyone wants to be doing it, but they need opportunities and structure to achieve it. I’m continually amazed and touched by the brilliant people who contribute week in and week out to DataKind UK, and our ever more sophisticated set of committees who help with ethics and processes, as well as the projects themselves. I’d struggle to qualify as a DataKind core volunteer nowadays, and that’s a credit to the quality of the organisation that the team has built.
• Ideas and stories are surprisingly transferable; technical solutions are surprisingly untransferable. It would have been fun and ego-boosting to develop a library of reusable technology solutions for the social sector, but any attempt to do that fell flat in the face of the diversity of the raw data, and of the ways different organisations worked. However, sharing stories and case studies that people could repurpose and adapt for their own charities was a fantastic way to help organisations get to the next level, using their own expertise to translate those case studies into something that worked locally.

So what’s next for DataKind UK? It’s not for me to help steer any more, but I think it’s time to get to the next level. We’ve done some great things alongside our social sector partners over the last seven years, and I think there’s room for the sector as a whole to really move ahead, taking advantage of data to achieve its mission faster and more effectively. I think DataKind UK will be a key part of that here in the UK, as we are a trusted and expert participant in bridging the conversation between data, tech, and social impact. I’m very excited to see the acceleration in making the world better that comes as a result.