The state's Child Welfare Digital Services hosted the third annual California Health and Human Services Agency Data Expo this week, an effort to get the agency's 12 departments to work together and share their data to better serve all clients.
During Tuesday's Expo, state workers from all departments within CHHS presented data projects, assets and successes, and shared ideas with their colleagues.
“You feel really good at the end of the day when you have an IT system that costs you lots more than you originally though it was going to cost you, that’s been delivered a lot later than you thought it would and doesn’t actually do what you wanted it to do,” Mike Wilkening, undersecretary of CHHS, joked in his opening remarks. “That is one of the things where we in state government missed the mark, because we can have something that’s exactly that and somehow decide that that was success.”
As part of the agency’s movement to use data more efficiently, it created a data-sharing agreement among all departments, which is intended to better provide services throughout all branches of the agency.
“California and this agency, like most governments, is data-rich and information-poor. We have a lot of information, we bring in a lot of information — a lot of data. We don’t use it very well and we’re not in the minority of that. In fact, most governments are very, very bad at this,” Wilkening said of the CHHS’ data usage.
One tool, developed by the CHHS about a year ago to help its departments utilize data well, is the Data Playbook. Scott Christman, CIO of the Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development, said, “It’s a tool or framework … for how you would go about using the data that’s available to you.”
According to Christman, who has been attending the Data Expos since the first one, they have come a long way. In the first year, the ideas and projects were primarily hypothetical — saying what the departments could use their data for. “Third year in, we’re talking about actual concrete examples from any number of our departments about how they’re actually using data to improve their programs.”
The OSHPD has made some organizational changes to use its data more efficiently. It also plans to improve data utilization to tailor and design user-centric programs that will better meet the needs of clients.
With a background in horizontal integration at the Department of Social Services, Adam Dondro, CHHS’ newly confirmed CIO, plans to continue pushing this kind of integration within the CHHS. He plans to use the agency’s data to improve customer service, allowing it to handle issues crossing several departments at one time, instead of having to seek out assistance from each department separately.
“[Our clients are] a whole person, and we haven’t historically treated them that way,” Dondro explained.
The CHHS will also be focusing on increasing transparency and open data. Additionally, a lot more innovation can be expected from the CHHS in how it uses the data to deliver its services.
A challenge the agency expects to face is how to combat security and privacy concerns. According to Dondro, “the agency has done a lot,” but establishing a balance between privacy and security and the value of data sharing among departments will be tricky.
