ONS Digital

Prynhawn Da / Good Afternoon and welcome to this week’s update on what we have been up to in the ONS Digital team.

So what’s been happening?

Over 100 people attended our Data Storytelling in Government last week, which brought together a range of speakers from the public and private sector, all with expertise in presenting and using data. The afternoon event was packed with insight into how data is and can be used to tell stories to a range of different audiences. The content covered, among other things, the importance of making data open and freely available, how analytics dashboards can be effective and the evolving role of the data journalist. We have asked attendees to formally give us their feedback, but comments give to us on the day included the calibre of the speakers and how the content will inform their own work projects. Many of the attendees have even asked us to make it an annual event – praise indeed. Interested in what was discussed? Then view the presentations.

In other news…

Our social media team supported the ONS’s first Economic Forum in London last Monday. It was well received and people at the event were grateful of the debate/Q&A being recorded on storify and slides available immediately after event. The Storify page has had over 1300 views since last Monday and has been shared by several high profile journalists and tweeters, with it also being embedded by Management Today.

We have started uploading our backlog of infographics to Wikimedia, so that authors of content on this site can use them in Wikipedia articles, helping to make the content more accessible to a wider audience. We have also discussed with our in-house information architect the need to remove content from our Guidance and Methodology pages before agreeing on a structure for user testing

It was fairly quiet for our design and editorial team with just two stories and infographics being released on Young people’s well-being, namely the differences between men and women and the barriers to people with disabilities, from the Life Opportunities Survey (LOS). However, there was a lot of work involved in putting these products together, particularly the infographic for the LOS  due to the complexity and sensitivity of the messages.

and finally...

The user testing lab is nearing completion with only the technical configuration and cosmetic touches remaining. We hope to be working on some pilot projects very soon, to test the set-up and the way in which we report on and share the findings with the business. This is an exciting time for us as we move closer to putting the user at the heart of all that we do and look forward to sharing our experiences with you.