While many have identified the challenges with designing such an ambitious piece of digital infrastructure as the National Data Library, the big question for government teams will be: What can teams do with all of this data once they have it?

This is a challenge many across government are already grappling with. Teams gain access to new datasets, sometimes from other departments, sometimes newly usable from within their own, and already understand a lot of the challenges they want to solve. What they often need is a way to generate new ideas quickly, test them with the right mix of expertise, and turn possibility into action. 

Maybe a new dataset has been shared with them by another department, or maybe an existing dataset has been made newly usable within their own team; without a clear understanding of how data can be used to improve a service both effectively and responsibly, the value of these new assets will be left untapped.

This was the very challenge which PUBLIC and the Department for Business and Trade (DBT) sought to tackle through a hackathon we co-hosted at PUBLIC’s office in February 2026.

Our aim for the event was to bring together a diverse group of around 40 SMEs, academics, legal professionals, policymakers, civil servants, data scientists, and engineers to build data-driven solutions to legal and policy challenges set by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ), DBT and the National Data Library (NDL) - specifically looking at how data from the National Archives could be used in innovative ways.

‍This diversity of participants was crucial. Often, ‘hackathons’ focus on engineers - looking primarily at the technical build of a new product or service. Our view is that, particularly within a public sector context, these kinds of hackathons can be made far more valuable when non-technical teams collaborate directly with the engineers. 

The technical build is absolutely a critical component, but so too is the user experience, legal and regulatory implications, and the practical reality of delivering service to citizens. When you bring together people with different areas of expertise - service design, policy, legal, engineering - teams are able to develop more robust and innovative solutions that stand a greater chance of delivering impact.

This is exactly what we found through this hackathon we hosted with DBT. By breaking the group into prototype teams based on the range of expertise and capabilities in the room, the participants were able to develop ‘fresh’ ideas which would not have been easily identified by a homogeneous team working in isolation.

The groups ended up developing ten innovative prototypes across 3 specific challenges. For more detail, you can check out the video below to hear from the hosts and participants about how valuable they found the day.

In just a few hours, the group developed prototypes for ten new tools with the potential to make a real difference across a range of services.  Although this hackathon focused on specific challenges set by DBT, MoJ and the NDL, the multidisciplinary approach is relevant far beyond this event. It offers government teams a practical way to generate new ideas and explore how data can be used more effectively.

‍This model of multi-disciplinary, collaborative hackathon can be a powerful tool for teams across government looking to identify innovative new ideas for how to use the data they now have at their fingertips.

If you’re interested in chatting more about the specific hackathon we hosted with DBT or the model of exploring data-driven solutions to challenges across other services areas, you can reach out to Gil Brandt, PUBLIC’s Deputy Director of Learning and Workforce transformation at gil.brandt@public.io.