Intelligent CIO Europe Issue 38 | Page 59

CASE STUDY

Working for the second largest police force in Britain , Helen Davis , Assistant Director of IT & Digital at West Midlands Police ( WMP ), has forged a successful path in an industry where women make up less than 10 % of the leadership team . Working with Cloudera and Accenture , Davis has transformed the force ’ s digital strategy using data to significantly improve operations . Now , she leads a team of data scientists and engineers and works alongside a bespoke data ethics committee to push the force ’ s data further than any other police force in Britain , to date .

Can you give us an overview of the Cloudera and Accenture solution and why you decided to work with those vendors in particular ?
We chose to work with Accenture and Cloudera as it gives WMP the combination of technologies and expertise that we needed to achieve the scale and complexities of our data aspirations . The partnership also affords the force access to traditional strategy , consulting and technology skills , to help support us through the implementation of technologies we ’ d never worked with before .
In partnership with Accenture and Cloudera , we have completely reworked our data analytics capabilities , implementing the Data Driven Insights Project . This move has increased our insights , allowing for informed decision-making which means we can better support our local community – the ultimate goal for any police force .
To start , we moved away from our previous fixed legacy system , to a cutting-edge cloud-based model . As a result of this updated framework , data can be accessed anywhere , by anyone with the right permissions , at any time , and is not restricted by storage space . Instead , we can now expand data storage as and when needed , without having to swap out any current information . Because of this pay-as-you-go method , we now have financial flexibility and the ability to grow . More specifically , since implementing the Data Driven Insights Project , we have been able to effectively manage the massive amounts of data we have access to , and provide it to those both in desk-based operational roles and out in the field , at the touch of a button . Instead of notes being made on paper , the digital touchpoints can be stored and analysed in real time . The project enables WMP to improve the quality , speed and efficiency of the way we share our information .

WE CAN NOW EXPAND DATA

STORAGE AS AND WHEN NEEDED ,

WITHOUT HAVING TO SWAP OUT ANY CURRENT INFORMATION .

What are some of the challenges the solution helped you to overcome ?
The main challenges we had were in relation to being able to address the consolidation and accessibility of our data . This sounds very simple , but it was a hugely complex and ambitious challenge . Previous to our work with Accenture and Cloudera , our data was spread across a range of legacy systems with many duplications and no clear single view . Access to some systems was also limited to an office or police station . This meant crucial data was sitting in silos , making it difficult to retrieve information and any queries
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