创新及科技解决方案

In government–whether local or federal–the pressure to provide faster insights on your agency’s programs rests squarely on your team’s shoulders. Although we live and work in a world with an overabundance of data, quick access to information and insights can be impossible if you struggle with a lack of resources, budget, and legacy systems.

Below, three common data challenges in government are addressed with use cases in public services and the benefits attained with Alteryx.

LIMITED BUDGETS AND RESOURCES

Public sector organizations are often lean operations, and both monetary and headcount resources are precious. There’s no shortage of data, but a lack of resources makes the ability to access and combine data from various sources, departments, agencies, and third parties a constant challenge. Highly trained data scientists who can perform advanced analyses are often unaffordable for public sector—which means government organizations must empower analysts with the tools to do more.

When John Matyasovsky Jr., a Database Manager and Systems Analyst for the Fifth Judicial District of Pennsylvania, was introduced to the modern self-service analytics platform Alteryx, the positive effect of the platform was immediate. With a two-week free trial, John was able to create an XML parsing process that normally would’ve taken months to build. “It was estimated that the free trial alone paid for the license investment,” he said

THE STATUS QUO

Nothing is more damaging to innovation than “the way we’ve always done things.” Whether the status quo is driven by mindset or legacy systems, government agencies that can streamline and automate report generation and analysis will not only be more effective, they’ll also liberate analysts to spend more time delivering unique insights instead of chasing their tails.

Because of built-in legacy systems, the US Patent and Trademark Office (USTPO)was forced to use legacy tools like COBOL programming. Antiquated systems like COBOL are slow-moving and cumbersome, negatively impacting in the office’s ability to provide timely analysis. The department needed a system of operating and performing analytics that could accommodate, support, and respond to internal stakeholder needs as they evolve. In other words, they needed to shift from static, ancient systems to a flexible, modern approach.

With Alteryx, analysts within the Trademarks office can easily extract data using business-friendly intelligence and analytic tools to manage both routine and ad hoc requests, like trademark application filing, prosecution, examination, registration, post-registration processes, and reporting.

“No one is more qualified to work with our data set than us,” said James Nosal, Program Analyst. “Data that used to be manually manipulated within Microsoft Excel in hours or days, is now blended, in seconds, with Alteryx.” The Trademarks office also uses Alteryx as an ETL tool to extract data on a nightly schedule. Data goes from a legacy transactional system and is automatically loaded into an optimized data model designed specifically to support analytical efforts.

(https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Use-Cases/Data-Analytics-Federal-Agency-and-the-Thirty-Year-Old-Legacy/ta-p/162629)

ON-TIME ACTIONABLE INSIGHTS

A major issue with analytics is reporting lag—by the time you understand what’s happened, everything has changed, and the data is no longer relevant. Increasing the speed, accuracy, and comprehensiveness of data analysis is critical to driving your agency’s future.

Following Hurricanes Irma and Maria, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) needed to rapidly assess damage to a minimum of 130,000 structures in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Extremely challenging conditions like blocked roadways and landslides made traditional field assessments slow and difficult. Additionally, the assessment had to include the effects of combined wind and flood damage from two distinct, but consecutive hurricanes. After the storm, teams visited 600+ structures and took detailed measurements to serve as training data for a damage model; and analytic teams built an Alteryx workflow blending over a dozen GIS and tabular data sets to serve as predictive variables. The model was updated and revised daily to improve the quality of the prediction.

This project helped over 100,000 people get on the road to recovery more quickly. It cleared a significant hurtle for them as far as rebuilding their structures and it gave the communities information that they really needed to start reconstruction. They evaluated about 146,000 structures, of which about 30,000 of needed an on-the-ground inspection. The net result was that only about 21% of the total needed further inspection, which saved tens of millions of dollars in the response effort. It also saved years in terms of the amount of time that it will take to recover in some of those communities. It was all made possible because of what they were able to do with Alteryx.

(https://community.alteryx.com/t5/Alteryx-Use-Cases/Alteryx-for-Disaster-Relief-Hurricanes-Irma-and-Maria/ta-p/313523)