Whether you’re a data practitioner or someone who works alongside data, you’ll know how daunting it can be to make sense of it – or help others do the same – but you rely on the numbers to shape the insights you need to make decisions that matter. This blog explains how storytelling techniques and service design bridge the gap between technical complexity and real-world understanding, all while shattering silos and shaping shared success.

Opencast’s Chief Executive Tom Lawson reflects on a year of challenge, change and growth, from tough decisions to renewed momentum and purpose-led progress.

This summer, Senior Enterprise Architect Paul Crisp became the first Opencast employee to complete a secondment into government through the Civil Service Digital Secondment Programme – after spending a year at National Savings and Investments (NS&I). He describes his experiences, including the challenges, opportunities and lessons he’s learned.

Agentic AI represents a significant leap beyond traditional automation. These ‘digital coworkers’ are proactive, goal-oriented assistants – and the technology has profound implications across industry, with the potential to transform services by working in real-time, 24/7. The adoption of agentic AI also introduces a new set of challenges – with rapid evolution of the technology outpaces regulatory frameworks, careful consideration is needed of ethical, legal and operational risks. the emerging opportunities, challenges and approaches to best practice in this space? 

In a sector where the ambition to innovate responsibly and improve patient outcomes is already widely shared, the real challenge for UK healthcare lies in making it happen. This means navigating organisational complexity, skills gaps, limited capacity, infrastructure challenges and leadership hurdles. How the healthcare sector can move beyond ideas and into delivery was at the heart of the debate at June’s Opencast discussion for TechNExt 2025. 

Public sector organisations face continuing restraints on the resources available to deliver the services they offer – but also face increasing expectations to deliver great services with impact. How can they deliver ‘more with less’ – or even the same with less? That was the key focus of June’s Opencast discussion alongside partner DWP Digital as part of the 2025 TechNExt festival. 

How can we help build digital capability in government and address the digital skills gap? June’s senior-level panel discussion, hosted at Opencast HQ as part of the 2025 TechNExt festival, explored barriers and challenges – as well as ideas and solutions for building future capability. 

Last week at the People and Culture Forum, I had the privilege of facilitating a conversation on the topic of neuroinclusion. Framed around the question “Is neuroinclusion a DE&I issue or a People Team imperative?”, our session opened up a space for honest reflection, discomfort, and commitment to doing better. 

Opencast joined forces last year with The Alnwick Garden to help it evaluate the impact of its showcase Lilidorei play project – and to develop an innovation framework to help Alnwick boost both its financial performance and impact. How did our agile approach to the project help? And what can others looking to innovate learn?