Canadian Government Executive - Volume 24 - Issue 06

14 / Canadian Government Executive // December 2018/January 2019 level of unprecedented granularity and timeliness. For example, fleets of freight trucks are often outfitted with “accelerom- eters” which can identify when and where a truck experiences a sudden movement. Aggregated over thousands of trucks, an infrastructure analyst could theoretically get an accurate and timely view of fre- quency of potholes at an intersection-by- intersection level. Value for Money While the cost of data can and has gone down in cost, it is by no means inexpen- sive. Marketers, representing both online and bricks-and-mortar retailers, can pay in the millions of dollars per year for a single subscription to certain data sets. These retailers can justify these costs because of the almost immediately measurable re- turns on investment. Likewise, a policymaker needs to have a clearly articulated business case. Will the project allow you to measure more precise progress made by a particular initiative (and therefore make a better case for sub- sequent top ups)? Will it help you to craft a narrative that there is a gap to be filled by a program or that an imminent crisis needs to be proactively addressed? Will it give senior decision makers and fund- ing agencies more comfort in a proposal that you are seeking support for? Will it improve your pitch when competing for investments against other governments? Will it help to validate self-reported met- rics made by a transfer payment or spon- sorship recipient? Will it allow you to sup- port local startups? A clear understanding of the value prop- osition will help you both in your request for funding and in keeping focused once the project has initiated. The Benefits of Early Adoption Instead of waiting for the perfect business case to present itself, consider that this is a unique time for governments to be proac- tive in exploring this opportunity. First, some of the data providers will have little or no experience in working with gov- ernment. From my experience, this can be both a challenge and an opportunity. On one hand, the government client may need some degree of sophistication to guide the vendor towards potential-use cases. On the other hand, the vendor may have increased flexibility in terms of pricing as they may be eager to showcase a real-world case study to help them unlock a new, and po- tentially lucrative, customer segment. Secondly, new and exciting startups are coming out of incubators and accelera- tors at a pace that can be hard to keep up with. Furthermore, traditional firms, such as payment processors, are experiencing an increased interest in anonymizing and monetizing their data. Early government adopters will benefit from having a head start in understanding the wide array of approaches and staying ahead of their peers. Consider the use case of estimating un- employment in a region. By determining that a certain number of phones are traveling to and remain- ing at work locations on a daily basis, you may be able to create a proxy for regional unemployment trends. However, there are several ways to track the travel pat- terns of smartphones in aggregate, such as through their GPS signals or by moni- toring cellphone tower access. Each data provider will have different sample sizes, accuracy, cost, and granularity thresholds in order to provide anonymity. Having the breadth of options available will help you to find the best option to meet your needs and budget. Take Baby Steps Start small. Many government depart- ments have a “show me first” culture, and senior decision makers may want to touch and feel a proof-of-concept or minimum viable product before committing further resources. That said, my experience has been that the move to non-conventional intelligence may ultimately not be for everyone, and conventional sources will likely always have a place in the policy maker’s toolkit. However, with the explosion of data and the exponential increase in machine pow- er to process it, there will be an increased emphasis on getting intelligence better, faster, and cheaper than other depart- ments, other levels of government, or even other governments across the world that may be competing with you for resources. The key point is to start exploring. C hristopher L au is a M anager in the O ntario M inistry of E conomic D evelop - ment , J ob C reation and G rowth where he leads the A dvanced T echnologies file . H e formerly worked in investment banking for M ergers & A cquisitions in the M ining S ector and in hardware engineering in S ilicon V alley . H e guest lectures at the U niversity of T oronto and U niversity of W aterloo and holds an engineering degree from the U niversity of W aterloo and an MBA (D ean ’ s L ist ) from the R ich - ard I vey S chool of B usiness . INTELLIGENCE Instead of waiting for the perfect busi- ness case to present itself, consider that this is a unique time for governments to be proactive in exploring this opportunity.