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Richard Davis, Chief Data Officer, Ofcom

Richard Davis, Chief Data Officer, Ofcom

Describe your career to date

I currently work as the Chief Data Officer in Ofcom, the UK’s communications regulator. Ofcom has a large regulatory remit covering the full range of communications including public sector broadcast, radio spectrum licensing, telecoms, infrastructure resilience and security, and recently added online safety to its powers.

As Ofcom’s senior data leader, I am responsible for enabling data to deliver a positive change across all of these sectors. Preparing Ofcom for the future by ensuring we have the latest technology, use the most up-to-date analytical methods, and scale our systems to support all policy and operations teams to have the insights and data needed to make data-driven decisions.

To ensure the best decisions are made, I support Ofcom’s teams to have the skills and capabilities to understand data. As head of the data profession, I support Ofcom’s data people to develop their careers and ensure they have the technical training to realise their ambitions.

Overall, my focus is on strengthening capability and governance to provide Ofcom with the people, tools, and mindset to achieve more with data. With the addition of online safety to Ofcom’s remit, this data capability has become ever more important. I am responsible for enabling the team to have the data to monitor the systems and processes of up to 4 million platforms in scope of the regime, with real time artificial intelligence (AI) to support the teams with trending information.

Before Ofcom, I worked for Lloyds Banking Group where I was the Group Head of Analytics. I had led the innovation function and then, in my final role, was the Managing Director for Data Products, enabling the commercialisation of Lloyds’ data assets. In this role I delivered over 100 data products with advanced analytics capabilities for fraud detection, credit risk analysis, and cyber threats.

My academic background is in applied mathematics and statistics. I have used advanced methods for multivariate statistics, machine learning, time series analytics, and data preprocessing methods such as wavelets in applications as diverse as economics, ecology, biochemistry, quantitative trading, portfolio optimisation, financial risk management, marketing, and telecommunications regulation.

I am a world leader in data, AI, and machine learning (ML). Having been keynote speaker at a number of international conferences, advised governments and international bodies on data strategy, applications of AI, and methods for standards and risk prevention in ML systems. I sit on the leadership group for the Scottish AI Alliance and was recognised as AI Implementor of the Year 2023 at the AI Summit.

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

A key part of Ofcom’s data strategy is focusing on data culture; both in our people and the wider data community.

This strategy has top-down approval from the Board, and we are working with them and the senior management team to provide data literacy training. The goal is to help them understand the value that data brings to their teams, and unlock this value through training, knowledge sharing, and capability building.
For all people across Ofcom, we have launched a data literacy programme in which we train people to understand how data insights are produced, the tools that have been used, the governance process, and give people the capability to question analytics results. The aim here is to get everyone talking the same language when it comes to data.

The data profession goes beyond this, offering targeted learning and development for people to build their careers in data across Ofcom. Ensuring line-managers have the support of more advanced data coaches to help people grow and learn, and highlighting where there are opportunities to step outside of people’s comfort zones, in a safe way, to develop new skills.

Finally, we are building a community beyond Ofcom to share best practice through open data and open code; disseminating knowledge and ideas and working collaboratively with others to deliver new approaches. We are setting up partnerships with academics, universities, and research institutes to get the most from our data people and offer them ways to grow their careers. This also pulls in expert advice externally through an academic and industry data panel to help improve our wider data literacy and understand what is coming over the horizon.

How are you preparing your organisation for AI adoption and change management?

As part of my role in Ofcom, I am recognised across the regulators – through the Digital Regulation Cooperation Forum – and across government as a trusted expert and advisor on AI; a subject that is becoming ever more important. I have advised the Scottish government, industry, and academia on AI through the Scottish AI Alliance where I am a member of the leadership group. I have advised international bodies on how best to prepare for AI. I have spoken at a number of international conferences on AI, ML, and best practice of these methods.

This background as a world leader in AI has enabled me to help train the Board and senior management team on all aspects of AI and help them understand where it can benefit the wider organisation. These value drivers operate across three key areas: enabling efficient processes, transforming Ofcom to become a more proactive regulator, and delivering a more proportionate regulatory experience in the sectors we regulate.

My team has worked to deliver a multi-year work plan for enabling AI to create value across these drivers in every regulatory team. Through this we have managed to secure buy-in for the wider data strategy, which builds Ofcom’s data culture and literacy, delivers the best-in-class data platform, solidifies the principles of end-to-end data governance, and ensures a consistent data workflow for all teams.

Beyond the capability to deliver AI across regulatory teams, I am also ensuring my team of experts feed into the discussions on AI safety, especially for frontier models, and help policy teams build their knowledge of the technical requirements and implications of the five pillars outlined in the Government’s AI white paper.

Richard Davis
has been included in:

100 Brands 2023 (EMEA)
100 Brands 2024 (EMEA)