Last January, I delivered a lightning talk at Data Matters 2025 with Michelle Scott from The Data Lab on building a data-informed organisation. We were speaking to data specialists, helping them to consider how to successfully engage other leaders, but in many ways, it was half of the conversation. Non-data specialist leaders are also keen to engage with data themselves but are thinking, where do I start?

First let me offer three observations:

A lot of data is noisy

Colleges and universities tend to be large and complex organisations that produce a huge amount of data. That commonly means that most leaders and managers experience of working with data is noisy; it’s hard for them to tune in to the specific datasets they need to do their work most effectively. This can confuse reporting and slow decision making.

A man in a blue shirt with fingers in his ears because of noise. — Photo by Ketut Subiyanto

A lot of data is disconnected

The number of systems that colleges and universities use mean that data is often disconnected or even fragmented. In a previous role, when reviewing student attendance to consider whether to make a referral to wellbeing officers, my team would often access multiple systems and spreadsheets to work out what percentage of their teaching had been missed, what reasons had been provided for any absences, and who their tutor was. This led to delays in identifying vulnerable students and being able to provide them the support they needed.

Disconnected scraps of paper pinned to a panel. — Photo by Ekaterina Belinskaya

A lot of data requires manual workarounds

When a lot of data is disconnected many of our colleagues resort to manual workarounds to use data effectively. The more that data is manipulated, the more likely it is for people to make mistakes when joining it or for errors to creep into the dataset. There is also a risk that the data is incomplete which can hinder the analysis and leave it more susceptive to peoples’ biases. This means that while many people are doing their best, they are often working in less efficient and effective ways that are ripe for improvement.

So, if you’re a leader looking to make better use of data, where should you start?

A blocked road with a detour sign. — Photo by Omar Ramadan

Develop your business questions

Perhaps it’s a cliché to consider data the new oil but it has a lot of potential value when it can help us make better decisions. This starts with developing business questions, for example, “What can our data tell us about how we can better support student wellbeing?” which can then inform insight requirements like “What other data might help answer this question?”. This sets up a collaborative approach with your organisation’s data specialists to maximise the value of your data.

Consider your data maturity

Jisc’s data maturity framework is a comprehensive resource to help organisation’s map their data maturity. It outlines three stages of maturity that can be helpful to consider:

Reactive
Proactive
Integrated

The less mature your organisation’s data is the more disparate its data is likely to be and the harder it will be to inform your decisions but as a leader you can encourage your team to take good data quality seriously. The more you do that the more you contribute to increasing maturity across the data journey to make good decisions for everyone.

A range of plants of different sizes. — Photo by cottonbro studio

Align with your organisation’s data strategy

Whenever we talk to people about any sort of strategy the consistent refrain is the importance of alignment. A growing number of FE and HE organisations now have or are developing a data strategy that clarifies who should be doing what. Even if yours doesn’t you can still reach out to your data specialists to better understand their approach. Either way, look for opportunities to align with what your organisation is doing to increase the organisation’s maturity.

Puzzle pieces being aligned and connected. — Photo by Diva Plavalaguna

So, what next?

With all this in mind, we’ve partnered with The Data Lab to develop Foundations of leading with data, a training module to equip further and higher education leaders and managers with the fundamental skills and knowledge to lead with data in their institutions. It combines Jisc’s expertise in digital leadership, and data maturity in education with The Data Lab’s cross sector experience in data science and AI.

What about you? Does this resonate with your experience of data as a leader? If so, maybe Foundations of leading with data is for you.