Abstract for UNECE Seminar on Statistical Data Collection (Geneva 25th-27th
September 2013)
Statistics New Zealand (StatsNZ) is New Zealand’s national statistical office. Currently
StatsNZ is implementing Statistics 2020 Te Kapehu Whetu. This is a transformation
programme which will enable New Zealand to achieve the official statistics system of the
future.
Statistics 2020 is comprised of several programmes. The Transform Collections Programme
is managing the modernisation of collection systems, business processes and supporting
tools in order to realise the vision of a world class collection function. One aspect of this
modernisation is to deliver an Internet mode of collection.
This work requires a marriage of skills from distinct subject areas, including collection staff,
questionnaire designers, statistical methodologists, subject matter experts, IT personnel, and
project managers. As with many change initiatives, each team often has its own compelling
argument with respect to how the internet solution should be implemented. For example,
collection costs have to be weighed against respondent burden; gold-standard methodology
against fit-for-purpose solutions; and finding time for research and development against time
for implementation. However, we have learnt that a little compromise and good
communication goes a long way towards resolving issues and achieving results.
Twelve months into the adventure, we are evaluating our progress, acknowledging our
successes, and identifying areas that require further development. However, success has
many colours. On the palette of a do-learn-do approach our greatest success has been
discovering that although we were equipped to deal with mountains, we were actually
stumbling over molehills. What we thought would be our greatest challenges, such as mode
effects and method of first Internet contact, were dwarfed by unexpected and potentially
show-stopping issues, such as security and editing and imputation capability.
Our lesson for the future is to map the terrain with greater precision before embarking on any
adventure, and never to assume we know the way. In this paper, we summarise our
experiences from planning, to implementing, an Internet mode for an annual survey of
businesses.