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James Morgan

James Morgan, Chief Data Officer, The Crown Estate

Describe your career to date

 

I had an early and brilliant induction to leadership as an Officer in the RAF which was a superb starter for ten. However, my career in data began as an analyst, learning the basics of how to manage, query, and interrogate data while being business, customer and outcomes focused. I then started to lead analytics, BI, insights, CRM and reporting teams for the likes of Sky, Hutchison 3G in Australia, and during my initial years at O2 Telefonica. 

 
Part way through my time at O2 I shifted focus to setting and implementing Information Strategies to deliver value through data, re-building companies’ data foundations and began leading end-to-end data transformations. I was lucky enough also to lead data and transformation teams and deliver new data ecosystems at the likes of British Gas and Sainsbury’s before spending some time running my own data consultancy. 

 
On returning to work on the client side, I spent three years at Asda defining and implementing their Information Strategy. This involved leading their BAU, Strategic, and Future data teams while transforming data capabilities as a part of Asda’s separation from Walmart. The work included delivering a whole new Data Ecosystem, Data Management and Governance Capabilities, Partnerships, data literacy, and Data Operating Model. 

 
In July this year, I became the Chief Data Officer at The Crown Estate and have started work to take the company on a journey to data centricity and value creation. 

 
I have also had the privilege of being involved with and holding several positions in great industry bodies over the years, such as the IDM Data Council, DMA Customer Data Council, and Women in Data. I regularly attend industry events and this year have chaired roundtables, presented keynotes, and judged at the DataIQ Awards. 

Data literacy is a key enabler of the value and impact from data. How are you approaching this within your organisation? 

 

Data literacy and building the knowledge and understanding about data is a key aspect of our overall Data Strategy and fundamental to our ambitions regarding data within the organisation. 

 
We have just kicked off our dedicated data literacy programme at the Crown Estate, starting with our first cohort this year. Working with a specialist third party, the programme is a well-defined series of activities tailored to groups at different stages of their data maturity. It involves a number of modules covering the foundations of data, interpreting and communicating data, technical training on analysis, and visualisation tools and storytelling with data. There is formal training within each module followed by sessions to add The Crown Estate context. The data literacy programme runs in cohorts and lasts seven months for each group and will be rolled out across the whole organisation. 

 
This specific activity is part of a wider comms and engagement programme around data and analytics at The Crown Estate. This includes posts on our internal website, Data Academy, digital newsletter articles, video podcasts, value creation spotlights, town hall sessions, lunch and learns, one to ones with key stakeholders, presentations at leadership events, and communities of practice. There will be particular focus on data management and governance with our data champions network, which includes the data ownership and stewardship community. Teams are also now being encouraged to attend external networking events and conferences as well as inviting partners to come in and present at internal events. 

Have you set out a vision for data? If so, what is it aiming for and does it embrace the whole organisation or just the data function?       

 

One of the first tasks I have undertaken since joining The Crown Estate has been refreshing the vision and strategy for information and data in the organisation. Vital to this has been explaining the role data plays in the organisation in driving and supporting the overall company strategy, direction, and outcomes. I firmly believe that a data vision must embrace the whole organisation and not just the data team. 

 
I have spent a significant amount of time with key stakeholders at all levels across the company, understanding their parts of the business and what they are aiming to achieve across short-, medium-, and long-term horizons. It has been fascinating for me to learn more about this superb organisation and the role it plays for the nation from environmental, financial, and social perspectives. 

 
The vision therefore has had to set big ambitions for data within The Crown Estate and I am now focusing on turning this vision and strategy into action. To do this, we have already kicked off a number of key initiatives to build out our data capabilities, become more data literate, embed data management and governance, and deliver value. These will feed into a multi-year plan to transform our data abilities and create a world class capability and team. 

James Morgan
James Morgan
has been included in:
  • 100 Brands 2021 (EMEA)
  • 100 Brands 2022 (EMEA)
  • 100 Brands 2023 (EMEA)
  • 100 Brands 2024 (EMEA)

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