Corporate report

Department for International Development Digital Strategy: annual update 2014

Published 19 December 2014

This was published under the 2010 to 2015 Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition government

1. Introduction

Two years on from the publication of our first digital strategy, this report sets out the progress we have made against those goals and it identifies our aims for the coming year.

Leadership is at the centre of our digital mission. Throughout the year we have received expert advice and knowledge from the members of the Digital Advisory Panel. They have influenced the direction of our activities, resulting in the project to improve our Management Information (MI) tools, and the review of how digital is used in DFID-funded international development programmes.

Our Digital Leader for the past 2 years, Richard Calvert, has handed over the role to Nick Dyer, Director General of Policy and Global Programmes.

This diagram represents the importance of leadership and staff capability in achieving the 3 elements of our strategy.

2. Delivering better results – using digital and technology in DFID-funded programmes

2.1 What we have done in 2014

We have reviewed digital work across programmes and policy teams. This involved a series of interviews with those involved in digital programmes, both in DFID and among some of our partners, plus advice from our Digital Advisory Panel. The resulting recommendations will be put to our internal Digital Steering Committee and will form the work programme for 2015.

We are required by Cabinet Office to approve all digital spending in DFID. The process is now embedded and programme teams are seeking advice from the Digital Team. This has led to improvements in programme design and cost savings by simplifying requirements. This has been achieved by concentrating on user need, moving web hosting to cloud, building our tools to be open source, and using free internet tools to communicate.

2.2 What we will do in 2015

Recommendations from the digital review that will inform the work programme include:

• improving co-ordination of programme planning, internally and with other donors, resulting in better procurement and re-use of proven interventions
• improving the skills and capability of staff involved in programme design
• building a community of practice to share evidence and gain a more in-depth knowledge of what DFID and others are doing
• becoming clear on our positions for strategic issues and promoting standards, such as UNICEF’s Innovation Principles
• promoting the work of the Digital Advisory Panel and looking for opportunities for members to get more involved in advising specific programme areas

We will continue to advise on and approve digital spending in programmes, ensuring it complies with the Government Digital Service (GDS) digital design principles and controls. Our aim will be to encourage DFID programme teams and their suppliers to learn lessons from digital technologies introduced in other DFID programmes. Re-using tools and sharing techniques that are proven to work will lead to faster results on the ground.

3. Making DFID easy to do business with

3.1 What we have done

We launched a Funding Finder tool on GOV.UK in August 2014.
It is a new way to help organisations such as charities and NGOs find suitable funds. It includes any DFID-funded grant scheme, fund or business support that organisations, individuals or businesses can apply for, relating to international development work. The drop-down filters help potential applicants to find grants that best meet their needs. It has received a favourable response from users who say it is now easier to find and compare funds.

We are continuing to consolidate internal tools and infrastructure as vital preparation for moving to common technology platforms. The One Government Overseas (1HMG) programme is aligning processes, people and systems across international-facing departments. DFID is participating in the development of the international platform and has factored this into its future technology strategy.

We have participated in the cross-government Grants Efficiency Programme with the aim of establishing a service for administering grants, underpinned by a digital system.

We are talking to suppliers and commercial partners earlier in the procurement process to improve outcomes and value for money. We are using digital channels to encourage innovation and communicate a coherent message to our supplier community. We are purchasing from the Digital Marketplace and awarding contracts to Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) wherever possible.

3.2 What we will do in 2015

• continue to promote new DFID funds through the Funding Finder and listen to and act on feedback from users to improve it, such as adding email alerts
• contribute our experience and digital expertise to the Grants Efficiency Programme team in Cabinet Office
• build a new system to manage our aid projects more effectively and openly share the code so that other donors and NGOs can use it
• continually improve our internal systems so that they are easier to use and make our business processes more efficient

Where current DFID services need to be improved or redesigned, we will follow the GDS design principles and the Digital by Default Service Standard and pilot the use of a departmental Digital by Default Assessment Panel.

The aim of the Management Information (MI) project during 2015 will be to support the objectives of the MI Strategy:

1. fit-for-purpose information: to support effective decision making, it is vital that data are trusted and appropriate for the purpose for which they are being used

2. culture of ownership and accountability: we wish to build a more effective MI culture across the organisation where people trust the data they use

3. skills and capability: building a multidisciplinary virtual MI team with members representing business, data analysis and technical perspectives would contribute to this shift

4. easy access: we wish to build on and continually improve our technical infrastructure so that we can provide effective MI to end users

The MI project will also contribute to another area of work in DFID, which responds to ideas emerging from the UN challenge to create a data revolution for sustainable development.

4. Open and engaging - improving the way we communicate

4.1 What we have done in 2014

Our Communications team continued to perform to a high standard and won an award for its communication of the government’s humanitarian response to 2013’s devastating typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines.

Social media took a prominent role at July’s Girl Summit which rallied a global movement to end female genital mutilation and child, early and forced marriage. DFID ran a digital campaign to raise awareness and gain support for ending the practices, providing a strong context for tangible action and pledging at the summit. The campaign generated 130,000 conversations and contributed to awareness of the issues and how citizens could join the movement locally and internationally.

Crises dominated the second half of the year with the biggest ever Ebola outbreak and humanitarian emergencies in Iraq, Gaza, Syria and neighbouring countries. We continued to publish high quality content on GOV.UK. Our statistics reveal that news articles about the Ebola outbreak, the Syria crisis, and the Funding Finder were the most visited pages.

Internally, digital capability in communications continues to grow with strategic communications staff completing training in social media monitoring and publishing on Twitter.

Communications at DFID places a high value on creativity and experimentation for digital campaigns, sharing best practice with the rest of government whenever possible. For example, we produced Medics Behind the Mask enabling the public to meet the NHS nurses and doctors helping to beat Ebola in Sierra Leone.

We also created the first Insta-documentary, created from Instagram footage in honour of girls affected by child, early and forced marriage and female genital mutilation (FGM).

‘What does freedom mean to you?’.

We continue to publish open data on international development data in the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI) standard. This includes full details of all international development projects, including documents, transactions, budgets and sub-national geographic locations. The Development Tracker re-uses IATI open data from DFID, other government departments, NGOs and private sector suppliers, and enables the public in the UK and other stakeholders to use international development data to see what results are achieved.

In addition, we continue to publish monthly spend transactions over £500 and other corporate open data.

4.2 What we will do in 2015

• work closely with GDS to make improvements to GOV.UK for our main audience groups

• continue to improve the quality and coverage of the IATI open data, and improve the traceability of international development funding through the delivery chain (NGOs, private sector, multilateral agencies)

• make changes to the Development Tracker in response to user needs, and influence the evolution of the IATI open standard through international engagement

• transition to the open document standard (by 31 March 2015), as another step in improving accessibility to DFID’s information

• our digital specialists will work with the team who are establishing a policy profession in DFID to ensure staff are aware of best practice in ways digital can support and enhance open policy making

5. Building staff capability

5.1 What we have done in 2014

In a survey carried out by Cabinet Office on smarter working practices across government (The Way We Work), DFID was the top performing department. This reflects our achievement in creating a modern working environment, introducing flexible working practices and modern IT tools, and indicates the willingness of staff to adapt to new ways of working.

To improve the digital skills of staff across the organisation, we have run awareness and development sessions for different staff groups at all levels. This included a hands-on session on collaborative social media tools for members of the Executive Management Committee, advice at the conference of deputy heads of overseas offices, and working with several heads of profession.

We organised a Digital for Development showcase for staff spanning 3 days, with presentations, panel discussions, keynote speakers and lesson learning. DFID staff supported GDS participation in Civil Service Live with case studies of our work.

In addition, we have developed a digital skills self-assessment tool for staff to complete: the Digital Quiz. We identified 6 areas of digital expertise that are required in DFID and devised questions to enable staff to measure their current level of knowledge and experience. The tool provides feedback on what level has been achieved and contains links to recommended resources to learn about new digital techniques and tools.

We continue to meet with the capabilities team in GDS and the wider cross- government network (including the Scottish Government) to identify new learning resources and share knowledge across departments.

5.2 What we will do in 2015

Once our staff have completed their digital self-assessment, we will:

• benchmark current skills levels so that team leaders can set goals for their staff to improve or share their digital expertise
• run further digital skills awareness sessions for staff
• run a programme of activities under the banner of “2015: Year of Innovation” to include workshops, seminars, opportunities for hands on exploration of new tools and techniques, and targeted training

As the self-assessment Digital Quiz tool has been built using open source software, we will share the code freely with other government departments so that they can modify it and use it with their staff.