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When disaster strikes, what is the best way to collect and make sense of the information? How do we transform the information overload of the 21st century into a solution that amplifies emergency response coordination and informs decision-making, rather than cluttering it?

The Coordinated Data Scramble helps to establish common situational awareness through procedures designed to improve data sharing

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in case of an emergency. It is about establishing a digital collaboration space to facilitate:

  • Community

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  • building and open collaborationenabling open, immediate, and dynamic conversations during emergency response, using tools such as Skype and Slack.

  • Effective use of tools to support collaboration

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  • such as Google Spreadsheets and Trello

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CDS also

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calls for pre-emergency planning and collaboration to help to identify emergency situations:

  • Who are the decision makers

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  • ?

  • What are the key questions that decision-makers need

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  • to answer?

  • What data (

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  • and analysis techniques) are needed to help

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  • clarify the answers to these questions?

  • What tools and techniques can be used to monitor the

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  • availability of information

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  • in real time and to improve access to this information?

When to use

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Coordinated Data Scramble?

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Coordinated Data Scramble can be activated just before

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and just after an emergency event.

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To

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be most

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effective, it requires internet connectivity, but some components of the work could be done

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offline.

The CDS will

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be more effective if the work to determine who should be involved,

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what tools should be used, what should be the priority activities

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, etc. are done before an emergency.

Who to involve?

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  • CDS is designed to be open and

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  • cooperative, therefore there is no

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  • fixed group of people who need to be involved.

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  • However, it will

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  • work more efficiently if it involves

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  • on-

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  • site and remote

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  • stakeholders,

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  • including representatives

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  • of all

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  • United Nations,

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  • NGOs, and local

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  • stakeholders.

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Steps to

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complete a CDS

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Step

Details

Advices

1. Identify a collaborative communication platform

 A

A common communication platform will be needed to

provide a

serve as the focal point for

coordination of

coordinating CDS activities.

Skype or Slack have

proved most useful

proven to be immensely helpful in previous emergencies.

  Check what

Verify that in-country

responders

stakeholders are

most

happy with

using

the use.

 


The

platform chosen has to enable

chosen platform must allow the addition of multiple participants and

enable instantaneous

allow instant communication, as well as

retain

keeping the chat history

 

.

 

2.

Establish

Create a group on the chosen platform

 

Establish

Form a group on the chosen platform and invite a few key in-country and remote

responders

stakeholders to join the chosen platform.

 The

The idea is that: people are added to the platform/group by existing members, as

and when

their participation

will be

is beneficial to the process of improving data and information sharing.

 3

3. Decide what other tools will be needed to

support the

facilitate collaboration.

 Things

Things to consider at this stage

include

are:

  • How to

keep track of
  • follow up on what has been discussed and shared?

  • How will members

will
  • know

who
  • which group is

the group
  • ?

  • How

to maintain focus
  • do you stay focused on the most urgent and important tasks?

 In

In previous emergencies,

google

Google spreadsheets have been used to create a

contacts

contact list

for

with all members of the group

,

and to produce

'

"daily summaries

'

" of

the

key information that has been

shared

communicated during the day.

Trello

boards have been

cards were used to track data needs, data analysis activities, and data availability.

Toolkit

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  • filled with

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  • twenty-five priority data sets and tasks to complete for each of these

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  • data sets.

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  • Please make a copy

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  • :

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  • This is a spreadsheet template

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  • that can be used to help

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  • summarize important information shared via

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  • instant messaging platforms.

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  • Make a copy

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  • /upload the document for each new emergency.

Resources

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  • DRAFT Dataset taxonomy  - includes a draft list of over 230 datasets categorized using the MIRA framework (thanks to

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  • for their significant

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  • contribution to the development of this framework), as well as a more detailed

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  • tentative list of

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  • twenty-five priority datasets that

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  • includes analytical guidelines on how to

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  • proceed.

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  • Work has also been

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  • initiated on disaster-specific

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  • practical guidance to provide analytical guidance specific to earthquakes, hurricanes, etc.

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  • All of this will

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  • be shared as soon as possible.

  • History

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  •  of CDS

  • Example of an emergency

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  • created to make maps easier to

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  • access

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  • , filtering them

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  • according to the key questions

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  • the map aims to

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  • document, or the key datasets

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  • displayed on the map.

  • Example of

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  • using data from the map filter to

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  •  shared daily during an emergency.

Haiti Case Study (Hurricane Matthew)

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A

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digital collaboration space has been set up to facilitate

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the coordinated data scramble for the humanitarian response to Hurricane Matthew, and to

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assist in the production of the Haiti Flash Appeal.

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The following tools were used:

  • Skype was used for instant messaging

  • A google spreadsheet was used for

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  • the compilation:

o daily summaries of

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conversations

o a

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contact list of participants

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o Collaborative key datasets

  • A Trello

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  • Board has been established to manage the flow of

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  • coordinated data scramble.

There were three digital coordinators dedicated to maintaining these tools and

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keeping the focus on

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producing the Haiti Flash Appeal.

Representatives from HDX (for curating public datasets) and

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HumanitarianResponse.info (for curating products) were

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on skype

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, to ensure that all data and products were properly curated

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.

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The diagram below shows the flow of Coordinated Data Scramble

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from Skype chats, to data sharing on HDX, to

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information kept on the Trello board

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.

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The

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Hurricane Matthew Map Filter

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 was created to improve access to emergency maps, and

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map analysis was created to show in near real

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time which datasets and information needs were being met through the sharing

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maps.

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An information visualization

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shared through the Hurricane Matthew Skype

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group (link

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to come)