ABSEC
Closing the Gap: Designing a Data Platform Where Aboriginal Communities Own Their Story
6,000+ Aboriginal children in out of home care. Just a handful of transfers back to communities and families each year. Technology to Change That.
Kablamo partnered with AbSec to design a Case Management Tool and Aboriginal Data Platform - enabling Aboriginal community-controlled organisations across NSW to manage casework, centralise strengths-based data, and support Closing the Gap targets. Aboriginal data sovereignty was foundational from day one: every insight, every dataset, every workshop artefact is owned by Aboriginal customers and the communities they serve.
“The platform will enable Aboriginal Community Controlled Organisations to centralise data, story-tell with their data, and support community decision-making.”
AbSec, NSW Child, Family and Community Peak Aboriginal Corporation
The Challenge
As of 2023, more than 6,000 Aboriginal children were in out-of-home care in New South Wales. Of those, only approximately 1,400 were managed by an Aboriginal Community Controlled Organisation (ACCO). The rest were managed by non-Aboriginal NGOs, organisations that, however well-intentioned, lack the cultural knowledge and community connections that Aboriginal families and children need. The national Closing the Gap agreement set a target to reduce Aboriginal children's overrepresentation in out-of-home care by 45 percent by 2031. Reaching that target requires a fundamental shift: transferring hundreds of cases annually from NGOs to ACCOs, and ensuring ACCOs have the tools, data, and capacity to manage them.
AbSec, the NSW Child, Family and Community Peak Aboriginal Corporation, sought a technology partner to design and build two future-facing and interconnected solutions. The first was a Case Management Tool (CMT) for ACCOs to manage casework related to Closing the Gap Target 12 (children not overrepresented in the child protection system) and Target 13 (families and households are safe). The second was an Aboriginal Data Platform (ADP) to replace manual spreadsheets with a structured digital system that could centralise data from multiple priorities, generate quantitative reporting, and support data-driven advocacy.
The challenge was not purely technical. AbSec works with approximately 35 associated organisations, each with different data types, formats, and levels of digital maturity. And everything, every insight, every data point, every piece of workshop material, had to be owned by the Aboriginal communities it represents. Data sovereignty was not a feature request; it was the foundation.
The Approach
Kablamo structured an initial Discovery and Co-Design phase with collaborative input and interaction with key Aboriginal communities and stakeholders, driving cultural intelligence, embedded in every decision.
Using Double Diamond and DVF frameworks, Kablamo facilitated deep discovery across AbSec's network. The process included stakeholder mapping, empathy mapping, persona development, user journey mapping, and benchmarking against existing systems. Kablamo participated in sector forums and ran interviews and workshops with ACCO executives, caseworkers, CFOs, IT personnel, and community leaders to surface the real operational picture: operational capacity, geographical coverage, accreditation status, and tool readiness.
This data was critical. To scale from a handful of annual case transfers to the target of hundreds, AbSec needed to understand not just the policy aspiration but the actual capacity of each ACCO to absorb additional families. Forums and workshops captured program innovations and unique approaches that individual organisations had developed. The capabilities required spanned human-centred design, data strategy, cloud data platforms, analytics and reporting, machine learning, and data visualisation.
The Results
By bringing together a diverse set of stakeholders and listening to the community voices that matter most, Kablamo co-designed and delivered a vision and product roadmap for a transformational Case Management Tool and a centralised sovereign data platform. The new platforms would be capable of providing a unified digital environment to manage casework and data analysis for Closing the Gap Targets 12 and 13, replacing fragmented manual processes with structured, reportable workflows and self-managed datastores. Critically, the platform designs incorporated key principles of indigenous data sovereignty, strong governance and scalability to support future growth.
Absec is now well positioned to plan and implement future phases of this critical project, bringing to life the vision of truly closing the gap and enabling Aboriginal communities to manage better outcomes for children and families.
Looking Forward
The AbSec platform represents a model for how technology can serve Aboriginal community self-determination. As the Case Management Tool matures and the Aboriginal Data Platform incorporates additional Closing the Gap priorities, the system can grow into a comprehensive intelligence capability for Aboriginal community organisations across New South Wales and beyond. Kablamo continues to support AbSec, with the shared goal of ensuring Aboriginal communities have the data, tools, and digital sovereignty to close the gap on their own terms.
