Dods Political Intelligence
Created a Bespoke Mapping & Data Visualisation Course for Dods Political Intelligence
Client Background
Dods Political Intelligence (DPI) tracks and monitors parliamentary debates, governmental announcements and changes in legislation and provides insights and analysis to organisations, so that they understand and respond to policy developments in their industry or sector.
Dods Political Intelligence Case Study
Created a Bespoke Mapping & Data Visualisation Course for Dods Political Intelligence
The Problem
When three members of the Dods team attended one of my beginner QGIS courses, it was pretty clear how beneficial my software — from analysing political data to creating visual maps for client reports — could be for their work.
After putting their newly learned skills into action, the DPI team realised they needed another course, tailored specifically to the political and constituency data they use daily. By training other staff members, it would help to:
Build confidence using QGIS for everyday data analysis and client reporting
Create impactful, visually clear maps for internal and external use
Standardise workflow and data visualisation approach across the team But would this challenge be successful?
The Result
You know the answer: Yes!
Following the course, the whole Dods team can now manage, analyse and visualise political and geographic data directly within QGIS. But not only that, but they can also produce professional-quality maps and reports for:
Election analysis
Constituency-level issues, such as sewerage spills to lobby MPs
Client briefings
And they can do it all in-house without relying on external GIS support. As a result, their work is now faster, consistent and better aligned with their clients' needs.
What I Did
Working systems don’t appear on day one, so to make sure the project was successful from idea to implementation, here was my process:
1. Review & Assessment
Set up calls with the team lead to confirm the team's learning outcomes based on what they want to learn and the immediate skills required.
2. Design of their bespoke course
On day one of the two-day course, the basics of QGIS were covered, so they all had the same foundational skills. Then, for day two, I created a series of tasks based on the data and information they would use in their work and for their clients:
Creating an exit poll map for an election cycle
Source & verify data and bring it into QGIS, such as the constituency boundaries
Add polling data to existing spatial data
Styling the data with the political party colours and creating a map output
Creating a hex cartogram of the same data to normalise the geography and remove the bias that we see when the data is shown in the constituency boundaries
Sourcing data and information for client queries on local issues, such as Heathrow Airport expansions or planning
Contextual data like the regional, local and parliamentary boundaries
Sourcing open source basemapping, place names and airport locations
Building expressions to locate information within the datasets loaded and create lists of MPs or local councillors who need to be contacted
Generating map outputs with custom labels and colours to suit their client's needs
Mapping sewerage spills with received data
Interrogating data sources and cleaning them before loading them into QGIS
Creating heap maps and density maps to illustrate the extent and duration of spills
Producing custom symbology to show which water companies were responsible for the highest duration of spills and where they were located
Building a proportional symbol map to show which constituencies had the most spills and find which MPs would need to be contacted
Creating a constituency/MP profile map for regular press releases
Creating a constituency map with features for boundary changes or other information from local events
Adding images and basic HTML to create a report with links and references to export as a PDF for insertion into their client report
Benefits of an in-person course
Hands-on practical learning on their machines
Fewer distractions from the ping of internal comms, so they’ll actually remember the lesson
Working in their teams to collaborate and discuss during the sessions
Better troubleshooting if things go wrong, so things like network issues or laptop problems can be sorted more easily in person
High level of individual attention with direct interactions