Data-Driven Decision Making for Public Sector Training

Learning Outcomes

• Apply quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis methods to public sector decision-making contexts.
• Evaluate the reliability, validity, and relevance of diverse evidence sources for informing policy and operational decisions.
• Integrate qualitative insights with quantitative data to develop comprehensive evidence-based recommendations.
• Analyse the ethical and legal implications of using data in public sector decision making.
• Demonstrate the ability to communicate evidence-based findings to diverse stakeholders in a clear and actionable manner.
• Design a decision-making framework that incorporates both qualitative and quantitative evidence to address a public sector challenge.

Target Audience

This course is designed for public sector managers, policy analysts, and officials involved in planning, monitoring, and evaluation. It is also suitable for professionals seeking to strengthen their evidence-based decision-making capabilities within government or parastatal organisations.

Prerequisites

None — open enrollment

Course Outline

Practicals

Overview

Practical sessions allow learners to apply data collection, cleaning, analysis, interpretation, and communication skills using real-world public sector datasets. These hands-on activities reinforce theoretical concepts and build confidence in using data to drive decisions.

Practical Activities

• Data Cleaning Exercise — Learners receive a messy dataset and perform cleaning tasks: handling missing values, removing duplicates, and standardising formats. (3h)
• Data Analysis and Visualisation — Using a cleaned public sector dataset, learners compute descriptive statistics, create visualisations, and perform basic inferential tests. (4h)
• Decision Brief Preparation — Learners analyse a dataset to answer a policy question and prepare a one-page decision brief with visualisations and recommendations. (4h)
• Data-Driven Project Plan Design — Teams design a small-scale data-driven project for their workplace, including objectives, data sources, analysis plan, and implementation steps. (4h)

Summatives

Each delegate is assessed continuously throughout the course via daily exercises, scored practical assignments, and a final summative test at the end.

Practical Assignments — 30%

Practical assignments are observed and scored against a rubric during the practical sessions. Each delegate's practical mark is averaged into a single 100% score and contributes 30% to the final total.

Daily Exercises — 20%

Every training day ends with a multiple-choice exercise scored out of 100%. The scores from each daily exercise are averaged across the duration of the course to produce a Daily Average mark, which contributes 20% to the final total.

Final Test — 50%

On the last day a final summative test is written. It is a multiple-choice paper with multiple-answer questions: each question may have more than one correct option, and a single wrong selection on a question marks the entire question wrong — no partial credit. The final test is scored out of 100% and contributes 50% to the overall mark.

Final Total

Component	Out of	Weight
Practical Assignments (rubric-scored)	100%	30%
Daily Average (multiple choice)	100%	20%
Final Test (multi-answer multiple choice)	100%	50%
Final Total	—	100%

All marks are recorded on the AATICD LMS and visible to each learner under their account.

Certificate

How it works

• Certificates are auto-generated on the AATICD LMS as soon as the marks pass the 50% threshold.
• Each certificate is a branded PDF with the delegate's name, the course title, the unit standard ID, NQF level, credits, and the date of issue.
• You can download or print your certificate from your LMS dashboard at any time after issue — there's no reissue fee and no expiry date.
• If you scored under 50% you can sit the final test again at the next scheduled session at no extra cost.

Where to find it

Sign in to the LMS, open your dashboard, and your certificates appear under My Certificates. Each entry has a View / Download button and a print option.

Training Discounts

Group discounts apply automatically — the more delegates you enrol, the greater the saving. Discounts are calculated at 3% per 5 delegates, scaling up to 40% off for 100+ delegates.

Delegates	Discount
5	3% off
10	6% off
15	9% off
20	12% off
25	15% off
30	18% off
50	30% off
75	35% off
100	40% off

3% discount per 5 delegates, up to 40% off for 100+ delegates. Contact us for a custom group quote.