(US and Canada) Ravi Krishnan, Chief Data Officer, State of North Dakota, speaks with Adita Karkera, Chief Data Officer, Government and Public Services, Deloitte – USA, about his responsibilities, working across verticals, and the Lighthouse Project.

Krishnan’s role at North Dakota includes application development. The team consists of 125 people engaged in application development, data management, governance, and implementation. The goal is to migrate to some of the more cutting-edge technologies for the future.

He notes that despite the learning curve associated with application development and his CDO responsibilities, his experience thus far with the State of North Dakota has been positive. He breaks it down in terms of data producers and consumers. The application function collects, produces and disperses data through the organization, and the data management function connects data to the other areas. 

Krishnan notes that agile transformation makes room for plenty of idea cross-pollination across verticals, providing good results for the entire environment.

He also talks about Project Lighthouse, an initiative to leverage data to better children’s future in North Dakota, focusing on education. The State of North Dakota has partnered with the Department of Public Instruction and the Department of Human Services to form a steering committee consisting of those who head each agency.

Trends, insights, and influences gathered from various data points — including childhood nutrition and education data —  will be connected across agencies to enhance lawmakers’ decision making to ensure North Dakota’s children have a better future.