Case study: The Government Research & Insights Database (GRID), Cabinet Office Digital
Case study details
| Metadata item | Details |
|---|---|
| Owner: | Analysis Function Central Team |
| Who this is for: | All government analysts |
| Contact: | Grid-platform@cabinetoffice.gov.uk and Peter.Cunningham@digital.cabinet-office.gov.uk |
Team / Department
Digital Analysis Capability Team, Cabinet Office Digital, Cabinet Office.
Situation / Action
The Government Research & Insights Database (GRID) is a digital technology project that provides digital capability to cross-government data and analysis teams. The primary functionality of GRID includes:
- Data pipelines (automated data collection)
- Webforms (user-submitted data collection)
- Data storage (data warehouse with permissions management)
- Data sharing (via digital integration or direct access by a government analyst)
- Data visualisation (Tableau, R Shiny, and Plotly)
The project has had many collaborations. Recent successes include working with the National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority (NISTA) to build an automated data pipeline between a government project performance datastore and GRID, then linking this data feed to secure online Plotly dashboards, while also making data available for analysts to query online. NISTA aims to unite long-term strategy with best-practice project delivery, “transforming UK major projects and programmes”.
Over the past year, we have also worked with the Government Recruitment Service to configure and host a ‘Robotic Process Automation’ solution. This involved agreeing and deploying digital architecture to support an external team of data analysts who configure and operate the robots to automate manual tasks.
We are also supporting a wider Cabinet Office analysis team, known as ‘DART’, to develop reusable AI solutions in government. Although still in the early stages, proof-of-concept solutions are already gaining traction, resulting in the creation of the Cabinet Office AI Hub.
We have also concluded our support for the Cabinet Office Diversity and Inclusion Strategy 2022 to 2025, for which GRID has provided ongoing data support during its delivery.
Outcome / Impact / Results
The GRID project now supports a wide area of deliverables. As a government technology project, GRID acts as the engine that sits beneath wider data and analysis teams to empower their onward delivery.
Whilst quantifying the exact benefit of such supportive technology is challenging, the positive effect has been tangible, and the project won the Evaluation and Analysis Award at the Cabinet Office Awards 2024 and is classified as a Cabinet Office “critical service”.
GRID now also has over 2,000+ users and hosts 100+ dashboards.
How this work supports the Analysis Function strategy
Cabinet Office’s work enabled automation, AI, and digital infrastructure (2), and supported data sharing across departments (3).
Find out more: a strategy for analysis in government 2025 to 2028