Recruiting: Non-executive directors, CFPD

Update: These positions are now filled. Thanks for your interest.

Closing date: Friday 11 June 2021
Interviews: Week of 14 June 2021
Salary: Unremunerated, expenses and insurance provided

The Centre for Public Data (CFPD) is a new, non-profit organisation that works to improve the quality of the UK’s public data to support civil society and democratic scrutiny. We’re non-partisan, and seek to build a consensus for better public data across Britain’s political parties.

We’re looking for up to two non-executive directors to join our new board. You’ll help us deliver on our mission, provide strategic support and cross-party engagement, and help us scale.

Why has CFPD been created?

Government, civil society and business in the UK is crucially dependent on public data - datasets and statistics published or regulated by the public sector.

As a nation, we have played a pioneering role in the collection and use of public data. But more recently, our institutions have struggled to keep up with change. A series of policy failures - including during the Covid-19 pandemic - share a common root: a state whose data processes and systems are often not fit for purpose.

Resolving this problem requires concentrated effort and partnership-building, which is why CFPD was founded.

How does CFPD create change? 

All data that is collected or published by public institutions in the UK - from environmental observations, to spending databases, to statistical series - is produced because a decision has been taken to do so. These decisions may be made by Parliament, Ministers, civil servants, regulators, local authorities and others.

We believe that all these decisions are susceptible to pressure - and unlike many more entrenched policy issues, often just a little engagement can significantly improve the details of how a particular dataset is collected and published, making it vastly more useful.

Our theory of change is that enough influence can be produced by carefully curated alliances for CFPD to become an organisation that routinely nudges different parts of the state into producing more useful data in specific areas of new policy and legislation.

And once this model is proven, our goal is to interest key decision-makers in systemic reforms to improve all public data, not just individual pieces of it.

Our current status

We currently have a single full-time staff member (the founder/director) supported by a group of expert volunteer advisors with backgrounds in government, the Civil Service, industry, and civil society.

We have raised over £300,000 in funding in just under a year, from three successful grant applications, and are starting to plan how to deploy that money effectively. Our creation of a board is directly connected to managing and deploying funding responsibly.

In our first nine months, we’ve already helped secure better public data on Covid-19 business loans and furlough support. We’re currently working to help secure high-quality data across several active policy areas, including the UK’s post-Brexit subsidy regime, street addresses, and online gambling regulation.

Our current challenges

Our challenges include:

  • Are our strategic priorities and work areas the right ones?

  • What tactics can we best use to positively influence policy development in each area?

  • How can we explain our agenda, and why data should be at the heart of modern policy development, to senior decision-makers?

  • Who are the key civil society organisations that we should be aiming to support and build partnerships with?

  • How can we recruit for specific skills, such as advocacy or media support, and when should we start to take on permanent staff?

What will you be doing, as a non-executive director? 

We are looking for non-executive directors who can help CFPD to deliver its mission, and help us with the challenges above.

The key responsibilities will include:

  • Strategic support: supporting and challenging the founder/director as they guide the organisation through its startup phase

  • Cross-party engagement: our organisation is not party aligned, and we need help to build consensus for reforms across political boundaries

  • Inclusion: ensuring that our work does not exclude policy areas that affect the most marginalised people in British society

  • Performance: monitoring and scrutinising our performance in meeting the agreed goals and objectives

  • Financials and funding: ensuring financial information is accurate and that financial controls are robust, and helping us develop a sustainable funding strategy

  • People: helping us recruit, and ensuring the team is well-managed.

Required skills and experience

We would expect all applicants to have at least one of the following:

  • Experience of creating and delivering effective advocacy or campaigning plans

  • Experience working at senior levels in government

  • Experience of previous reform efforts relating to data or statistics in the UK

  • Experience of running and scaling a small organisation, especially a non-profit.

And any of the following skills would be useful, but are not essential:

  • Governance and board experience

  • Financial management

  • Media contacts and expertise.

You don’t need to have deep data or statistical skills, you just need to share our vision for the potential created by public data.

CFPD is committed to equality of opportunity, and we’re especially keen to hear from people from backgrounds that are under-represented on boards.

Also, you don’t need to have been on a board before. If you think that you have the skills to help us achieve our aims, we would welcome your application.

Time commitment and duration

The board currently meets quarterly via Zoom, though we may meet more often while the organisation is still new. We’d also like to schedule occasional one-on-one catch-ups between the director and board members, and be able to drop you the occasional ad hoc question.

We anticipate that the role will take around four days a year in total.

Non-executive directors will be appointed for an initial term of two or three years. The term may be renewed once, if the director and the board agree. 

Payment

We’re a CIC and don’t generate a profit for shareholders - all our income is spent on our work. As is usual for UK non-profits, these roles are unpaid, but we will cover any travel costs or expenses. We can offer you directors’ legal insurance, if required.

How to apply

If you’re excited by the potential benefits created by improving public data, and our approach to change, and you can help us work through these issues - then we’d like to hear from you.

Please email contact@centreforpublicdata.org with a brief CV (or link to one), and a few sentences on why you’re interested and what you’d bring to the role. The closing date is Friday 11 June 2021. If you’d like to ask any questions, please get in touch with anna@centreforpublicdata.org.

Not for you? We’ll be recruiting for a variety of roles during 2021, and we’re always keen to hear from people who are interested in public data. Drop us a line at contact@centreforpublicdata.org or sign up for news.