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Alistair Bullward

Alistair Bullward is Head of Function for Analytics, Data Services

Head of Function for Analytics, Data Services

My background isn’t a standard techie one. I studied Philosophy, Politics and Economics for my undergrad degree and completed a Masters in Political Philosophy before joining BT’s graduate scheme. Even at that stage, I wanted to get involved in the public sector. Whilst at BT I was lucky to work with range of public and private organisations. 

I’m proof that if you are interested and logical, and you want to do something useful, you don’t need a STEM background to get into data and technology. 

I joined the NHS because there is a guiding star of values to improve lives. It’s been really motivating and you realise how resilient you can be surrounded by people who share a common goal. 

When COVID-19 hit, my role morphed into leading a team creating visualisations from coronavirus data that helped the public understand what was going on and also provide data to professionals to try and get the response right.  

This was only one team among many but I am proud of what we achieved and as we hopefully emerge from the crisis, we are now focusing on developing our data capability for ‘peace time’ so we can continue to make a difference. 


Blogs

The authors Alistair Bullward and Sam Hollings.
By Alistair Bullward, Sam Hollings. 5 January 2023 Why we’re getting our data teams to RAP

Reproducible analytical pipelines (RAP) help ensure all published statistics meet the highest standards of transparency and reproducibility. Sam Hollings and Alistair Bullward share their insights on adopting RAP and give advice to those starting out.
Collage image of 2 men jogging with face masks surrounded by graph lines and hexagons.
By Alistair Bullward. 22 February 2021 How we're improving our data dashboards

Alistair Bullward, Product Owner for Open Data and Data Visualisation, provides an update on our open and live data dashboards that are helping to battle COVID-19 and help build a better NHS for the future.
Alistair Bullward working from home with his headset on.
By Alistair Bullward. 10 August 2020 COVID-19 data dashboards: From prototypes to a solution serving thousands in weeks

Alistair Bullward, Product Owner for Open Data and Data Visualisation, explains how we moved swiftly to provide a robust, mature data service to help with the coronavirus response.

News articles

Dashboard graphs
23 April 2021 3 million views for Covid In Your Area app

An online app which lets people find out the number of Covid-19 cases near their home has been used more than three million times.