1. Copyright 2010, The World Bank Group. All Rights Reserved. Statistical organization Principles and models Part 1 Strengthening Statistics Produced in Collaboration between World Bank Institute and the Development Data Group (DECDG)

2. Copyright 2010, The World Bank Group. All Rights Reserved. Principles of organization Theoretically, there are many different ways to organize a statistical office In practice there is a great deal of similarity in the organization of statistical offices across the world For example: a director of economic statistics from the statistical office of country A is likely to find a counterpart with very similar responsibilities in country B The same applies to a director of social statistics or national accounts, etc. This demonstrates that there are common underlying principles at work when it comes to organizing statistical agencies Basically, there are two ways of organizing a statistical office: by subject matter and by function 2

3. Copyright 2010, The World Bank Group. All Rights Reserved. Subject matter and function/1 ‘Subject matter’ may relate to the institutional source of the basic information that is collected or to main categories of data Thus ‘subject matter’ leads to the creation of divisions such as trade, industry, health, education etc. ‘Function’ leads to divisions such as methods, data collection, data processing, data analysis, dissemination. It is impossible to make a clear cut choice between ‘subject matter’ and ‘function’ 3

4. Copyright 2010, The World Bank Group. All Rights Reserved. Subject matter and function/2 ‘Therefore, the structure of most statistical offices is a mix Some functions are ideally suited to be grouped into agency wide functional units, e.g. data collection, data processing and data analysis. Other functions, such as questionnaire and publication content and analysis/interpretation require close involvement of subject matter specialist and should therefore be assigned to subject matter units. 4

5. Copyright 2010, The World Bank Group. All Rights Reserved. Organization and reorganization/1 There may be reasons for changing the organization structure However, reorganization entails risks and costs Changes may create confusion and uncertainty Undue changes may antagonize staff and create factions Organizations are not ends in themselves 5

6. Copyright 2010, The World Bank Group. All Rights Reserved. Organization and reorganization/2 The organizational chart should be simple and easy to explain It is advisable to limit the number of hierarchical levels; at the same time the span of control of supervisors should remain manageable If a reorganization is unavoidable, the process must be as brief as possible, while the views of all staff members must be heard The reasons for reorganization should be made perfectly clear 6

7. Copyright 2010, The World Bank Group. All Rights Reserved. Special considerations for statistical organizations/1 There are sharp fluctuations in the work flow; to even out the work flow it may be a good solution to combine tasks with different seasonal patterns. For activities that affect corporate identity, it is important to aim at strict agency uniformity, and these activities should be placed under unified control in one organizational unit. Statistical offices are sometimes confronted with the question of whether or not it is financially efficient to outsource certain functions. Catering, janitorial services, security, printing and sometimes part of the dissemination activities may be successfully outsourced 7

8. Copyright 2010, The World Bank Group. All Rights Reserved. Special considerations for statistical organizations/2 Some more general (e.g. basic computer skills) as well as specialized types of training (e.g. management training) can often be bought More controversial is the outsourcing of interviewing!!! Another controversial issue concerns the extent to which certain computer services should be bought or self-produced 8

9. Copyright 2010, The World Bank Group. All Rights Reserved. Functions of statistical organizations – Office of the Chief Statistician The office of the chief statistician should carry out three kinds of activity: Strategic and operational planning Management of the statistical agency by giving direction to its financial administrator, chief of personnel and the managers of substantive programs Management of external relations, first of all the ministry responsible for the agency, but also the key government counterparts, the country’s legislative authorities, the media and the chief statistician’s peers abroad These activities may be executed directly or through advisers (Deputy Chief Statistician) 9

10. Copyright 2010, The World Bank Group. All Rights Reserved. Functions of statistical organizations – field organization The field organization should serve all of the subject-matter departments in the statistical agency; sometimes there are separate organizations for household and business inquiries The field organization performs the following functions: Maintaining contact with respondents; explaining to respondents the purpose of a statistical inquiry, securing cooperation, and retaining respondents’ goodwill Providing feedback to the rest of the statistical organization regarding: (a) the quality of the frame after it has been tested in the field; (b) the receptivity of respondents to a particular statistical inquiry and the instruments used to conduct it Taking charge of the initial editing of the information collected; there is no set boundary between the responsibility of the field organization and that of the subject-matter departments Researching effective methods of data collection, including necessary adaptations of questionnaire and classification standards, techniques of persuasion, incentives and deterrents 10

11. Copyright 2010, The World Bank Group. All Rights Reserved. Functions of statistical organizations – subject matter departments Subject-matter departments perform a number of unique functions: To assess user needs and the most cost-effective way to meet them, as well as to forecast future needs To develop the best methods for collecting relevant information, given the constraints imposed by the need to limit the reporting burden To balance the requirements of users with other considerations, such as the need to use standard definitions, international classification standards and the requirements of the macroeconomic accounts To process data: data editing, tabulation, analysis, preparing materials for dissemination To document the quality attributes of the data produced and make the results accessible to both researchers and the general public 11

12. Copyright 2010, The World Bank Group. All Rights Reserved. Need for collaboration/1 Two set of tasks to be performed to produce statistics: The first part relates to subject matter issues Subject matters specialists work together. Also with the external users. Also with centralized activities such as the field organization. The second group of relations relates to those staff responsible for equipment and computer programs. Project leaders A Steering Committee may be established for oversight Relations with senior management 12

13. Copyright 2010, The World Bank Group. All Rights Reserved. Need for collaboration/2 Effective statistical operations require the collaboration of different functions. Another way of looking at this can be by looking at the various phases of the survey process. The first phase is the exploration phase: The second phase is examining how the survey objectives are to be made operational Whereas the first stage is output- and user- oriented, the second phase is process-oriented and involves the NSO and the respondents The third phase is the actual implementation of the survey; The fourth phase is using the set of raw micro data for processing and analysis: The data warehouse that results from the fourth phase is the source for tabulations, the final products of the statistical process, 13