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In 2017, the European Commission estimated that over 1.2 million UK businesses are underperforming due to “insufficient digital awareness and lack of necessary skills”.  

As far back as 2015, the House of Lords stated that digital skills should be taught as the third “core subject” alongside numeracy and literacy.   

The Department for Digital, Culture, Media, and Sport’s report in June 2019 – No Longer Optional: Employer Demand for Digital Skills - found digital skills are becoming near-universal requirements for employment.    

What’s key for employers is providing their employees with a basic level of digital skill and creating the platform for them to progress.   

A lack of digital skills 

Too often, companies invest in expensive software and systems to improve digital performance and wonder why it hasn’t done what they thought.  

FutureDotNow carried out research based on 20 digital skills tasks that industry and government agree are essential for work, and the number one missing skill was using digital tools in the workplace. 

Embedding digital skills from top down is also essential. There’s still some shame attached to admitting you’re not digitally confident, however it could easily be the chief executive lacking the skills.  

I spent a lot of time talking to employers, training providers, schools and colleges about digital skills; pointing out the need to not only train learners but look within and check your own employees had the skills needed for their job.  

It was then that it dawned on me that despite working for an educational charity, we hadn’t practiced what I was preaching. What was the state of NCFE’s digital skills amongst its staff? Do we have a need to develop them further?  

Understanding digital skills  

Digital skills are different to maths where people are quite open in admitting their weaknesses. There’s embarrassment in admitting to poor digital skills, particularly in an increasingly digital world. 

So, NCFE set out to provide a route to allow its staff to understand their digital skills levels without the fear of being named and shamed, whilst providing a route to improve those skills.  

We set up a page for colleagues that took them straight into an initial assessment for essential digital skills. From there, they could identify the level they were working at. Following this, they had several options:  

• plug their skills gap with some online learning 
• do an Essential Digital Skills Qualification through training provider, Learning Curve Group  
• do nothing.  

The results 

The data showed that 229 members of staff, from the CEO to flexible workers, underwent an initial assessment; 7% came out at Entry Level 3 and 93% at Level 1. For those worried about the time taken up by employees, the average time was 15 minutes.  

Of the 229, we saw 173 access resources to develop their essential digital skills. While the numbers don’t show how far they went, even if a colleague did one thing to gain more confidence, that will have a significant impact on their ability to perform at work or in life.  

Our Head of Customer Service, Brian Queen, event went on to share more information about his experience of upskilling his digital knowledge as a result of this programme.

The point of this is to show how you can measure your own employees' confidence and abilities in digital skills – all while providing an easy path to upskill. That this can be done privately without embarrassing or uncomfortable conversations with line managers enhances participation.  

If you’re interested in understanding more about how you can support your staff with digital skills, you can learn more about our No One Left Offline campaign here.