The future of digital training at Oxford

Blaine's blog discusses the following points:

• Digital capability is not just about knowing how to use technology, but also about when it's appropriate or not, and which technology to adopt.  

• The digital skills health check and resource finder can help you assess your skills and access courses and resources to develop your digital capability, irrespective of your role.   

• A new vision for building digital capabilities is evolving, with a view to improving services and adding more value.  

In recent years, IT training has changed a lot. It's not just about knowing how to use technology, but also when it's appropriate or not, and what technology we should adopt. It's so integrated into our day-to-day lives, and has become such a key enabler in our work, that we're all under pressure to get comfortable using and understanding technology – even if we don't work in IT. This holistic view is called digital capability. 

IT training has changed but our mission hasn’t  

The IT Learning Centre has been around for a while. Over three decades, we’ve helped tens of thousands of people learn, adapt and feel confident participating in our increasingly digital university. The technology might change, (we used to run a VHS library!) but one thing hasn’t - our mission will always be to help you participate effectively and confidently in your use of digital technology at the University, irrespective of your role. 

Digital capability 

Being digitally capable helps you to thrive in today’s increasingly digital world. This can sometimes seem daunting because things change so quickly. Our mission is simple: to demystify ‘digital’ and empower you for success.  

We do this in two ways: 

1. Our digital skills health check provides a simple way to assess your current capabilities against a framework developed specially for higher education. You take a free, engaging self-assessment and within 20 minutes you will receive a personalised report pinpointing where you might like to focus your training. 

2. Our resource finder brings together many fantastic digital capability courses and resources from across the University into a single place - think ‘Deliveroo for digital capabilities’. This helps you to easily connect with the resources most appropriate for your role and learning preferences. 

We also help other training centres around the University by creating, managing or optimising local training provisions. 

Strategic alignment  

The Professional Services Together programme recognises that digitally capable people are essential to delivering and improving everything we do. Technology supercharges our ability to work together as one confident, effective and inclusive team, even if we’re not in the same office.  

Our service helps by providing opportunities for all members of the University to develop skills and capabilities that enable them to confidently and effectively use digital technologies in their work.  

Digital capabilities are also critical to digital transformation at the University. In 2022–23, the IT Learning Centre and the Digital Transformation Programme jointly funded the pilot phase for the digital skills health check and resource finder. The IT Learning Centre used this phase to co-design this offer with input from stakeholders across the divisions.  

Vision for the future 

We’re always looking to improve our services and add more value for you. We’re working with our internal and external partners to sketch out an exciting vision for building digital capabilities over the next few years. Nothing is finalised but I’d love to share some of the ideas we’re considering. These include: 

• Expanding our resource finder to catalogue as much training content as possible 

• Role-based support that includes recommended standards and training pathways 

• New support for managers and leaders to help them ‘think digitally’ with their groups 

• Better data capture and evaluation about digital capabilities at the University. 

It can be hard to pre-empt what most people would find useful. If you have ideas, I’d love to hear from you. You’re welcome to contact me directly via Teams or by email (Blaine.Roissetter@it.ox.ac.uk). 

In the meantime, you can get started by taking our free digital skills health check.

Take control of your digital capabilities and get ahead of the curve. 

Links 

• Digital skills health check 

• Resource finder 

• IT Skills homepage 

• Professional Services Together programme