Assessing readiness to use data for racial equity

This section introduces the Racial Equity Program Data Readiness Assessment. It contains five data readiness benchmarks you can use to guide discussions about your program’s readiness to engage in and support data-driven racial equity work.

Intro summary

We define program data readiness as having the knowledge, resources, and capacity to collect and use data to promote racial equity. After applying a racial equity reframe, your program is encouraged to review the Racial Equity Program Data Readiness Assessment and reflect on whether your program has basic data infrastructure and analytic capacity in place to support data-driven racial equity work. 

The Racial Equity Program Data Readiness Assessment can help your program:  

• Understand benchmarks that assess engagement in data-driven racial equity work.  
• Assess its ability to collect and use data to promote racial equity.  
• Identify gaps in knowledge, resources, and capacity related to data readiness. 
• Use tools and strategies to build capacity for data-driven racial equity work. 

The assessment consists of five data readiness benchmarks, each with their own transition strategies and resources. You will be able to assess your readiness across a continuum for each benchmark and transition strategy. 

Data readiness benchmarks

Figure 2.1: Program data readiness benchmarks 

The Racial Equity Program Data Readiness Assessment is designed to help programs examine their data capacity to support data-driven racial equity work across five data readiness benchmarks. Your program should strive to achieve the following: 

1. Data capacity: The program has dedicated staff that can analyze data to be used in program monitoring and decision making while centering racial equity.  
2. Performance measurement: Program reports on performance measures in real time to identify areas of improvement while centering racial equity. 
3. Data quality: The program collects and reports comprehensive and complete individual-level data to inform racial equity work.
4. Contextualized data: The program contextualizes data using a structural framework to understand and improve equity in outcomes in their program. 
5. Quality improvement: Continuous quality improvement is thoroughly integrated in the program and a quality improvement team effectively uses improvement methods to address identified inequities.  

Data readiness continuum 

The Program Data Readiness Assessment categorizes readiness on a continuum with three phases: pre-foundational, foundational, and aspirational. Programs will fall somewhere on the continuum for each benchmark depending upon their current access to data and analytic support. 

Programs in the pre-foundational phase do not have the knowledge, resources and capacity to meet the benchmark. Their focus should be on building their capacity in that benchmark area. Programs at the foundational phase have limited knowledge, resources and capacity to meet the benchmark and should continue building readiness to maximize efficiency and effectiveness in this area. Programs at the aspirational phase have and apply regular knowledge, resources and capacity to meet the benchmark.  

Programs do not need to reach the aspirational phrase for each benchmark to use the road map.

Your program is encouraged to assess where you fall on the continuum for each benchmark. You may be pre-foundational for one transition strategy and foundational for another. This is expected. The self-assessment will allow you to identify gaps in knowledge, resources, and capacity which will facilitate goal setting in order to reach the aspirational phase for each benchmark.  

Program data readiness benchmarks

Figure 2.2 Continuum of data readiness benchmarks

• Pre-foundational: The program does not have the knowledge, resources, and capacity to meet the benchmark.
• Foundational: The program has limited knowledge, resources, and capacity to meet the benchmark.
• Aspirational: The program has and applies appropriate knowledge, resources, and capacity to meet the benchmark.

Transition strategies 

Figure 2.3: Program readiness transition strategies and transition resources  

Each benchmark is associated with transition strategies. Transition strategies are action-oriented activities that can be used to move along the continuum towards the aspirational phase for that benchmark. For example, within the Data Capacity Benchmark, one transition strategy is to analyze data for racial equity. At the pre-foundational phase, a program may routinely analyze aggregate data. However, to reach the aspirational stage, programs would routinely include contextual language that is explicit about structural racism in their data dissemination products. The transition resources listed support programs in moving from the pre-foundational to the aspirational phase.

This is not intended to be a ‘one size fits all’ assessment. Some transition strategies and resources may not be applicable to your program or may need to be adapted to your program context. 

Reflection

It is recommended that the Racial Equity Program Data Readiness Assessment be reviewed as a team including leadership, managers, supervisors, programmatic staff, epidemiologists, and other staff who support your program. This team should engage in a discussion related to data readiness and reflection on areas for growth:

• What are the current strengths related to racial equity work?
• Identify where program benchmarks are “foundational.” What are the transition strategies that will bring the program to “aspirational”? 
• What areas are “pre-foundational”? Do they cluster in one particular benchmark? What are the barriers to transitioning to “foundational”? 

Once you have identified the phase your program is in, consider developing goals to move your program along the continuum towards the aspirational phase. If you find your program is lacking readiness through this self-assessment, you may need to engage in capacity-, knowledge-, and/or resource-building to fill any major gaps and to increase program data readiness. Transition resources can help you in this process. 

Visit the Racial Equity Program Data Readiness Assessment regularly to reassess your readiness status.