CRN Greater Manchester core team blog series: The Business Intelligence Team
In an increasingly complex world, data is having a profound impact on the way we work, seeing and understanding our data has never been more critical. Data helps us understand and improve processes which supports informed decision making, having modern built functional research data systems is a vital part of capturing secure and reliable source data.
We support BI (Business Intelligence) activities across Greater Manchester and North West Coast for our core teams and partner organisations. Through continued engagement, training, and collaboration we resolve any technology-driven processes for recording or analysing research data, supporting teams to deliver their Portfolio studies efficiently.
Our work crosses over with the Digital Team. We cover data management as a reliable, secure & reusable resource across the IRIS (Integrated Research Intelligence System) LPMS (Local Portfolio Management System) and CPMS (Central Portfolio Management System) the Digital team utilise digital technology as the engine for continuous improvement including report building and digital solutions for internal team processes.
The depth of our roles varies between programmes, we provide information to support decision making, share knowledge and help in tracking performance and progress within the programmes.
There isn’t a typical day, as our plans can change due to priority work filtering through however an ideal day would only have a couple of meetings and the chance to go through pieces of work sitting on the back burner.
Population Health research is a big focus this year especially regarding how we can be more inclusive when it comes to our local population. Regardless of postcode, ethnicity, or age, everyone has the right to take part in research. We are currently capturing year of birth data across all partner organisations via our Local Portfolio Management system. This will enable us to ascertain age profiles participating in studies across the region and specific disease areas.
We are collaborating with local partners to develop a local app to link various datasets and provide analysis of regional demographics. This will help identify underserved areas where research needed is not reflective in our activities so we can plan where more relevant research studies could be placed.
It’s been a busy year so far for the BI Team, as we started to collaborate across Greater Manchester and North West Coast to align our processes where applicable. As a team we are excited and looking forward to the challenge of providing reliable, relevant data via efficient processes providing an exceptional experience for participants, helping support our research teams and improve the health of the North West region.
Craig Johnson
Head of Information Management and Technology
NIHR Clinical Research Network Greater Manchester
The views and opinions expressed in this blog are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the NIHR or the Department of Health and Social Care.
