There's a growing awareness that business has a major role and responsibility in tackling digital exclusion. We support corporate clients to run programmes that make a difference.
What we offer
- Our clients range from major financial institutions to global tech consultants.
- Our work usually supports a wider digital inclusion piece. Companies come to us with different priorities, ranging from engaging employees with volunteering to taking their customers with them as they become "digital first".
- Most start with Inspire, some then combine it with the Digital Champions Network. We've found that every company we work with uses our products in different ways for different ends.
- The process usually starts with an in-depth consultation stage as we work together to ensure the project is closely aligned to organisational goals and structures, and set-up to can be implemented to maximum affect.
- Wherever you are with your digital inclusion offer, we can help!
Priorities for Corporate Digital Inclusion
Our clients usually come to use with one or more of these drivers. These can change and evolve as the programme grows:
- Corporate Social Responsiblity: companies can create coherent strategies based round digital inclusion that are aligned to their business goals and to the skills and interests they already have within the organisation.
- Employee Supported Volunteering: a solid ESV programme is a good employee differentiator. A digital inclusion based one leverages existing skills that be put to good use quickly, and create a purposeful, long lasting legacy.
- Digital Service Transformation: we see this on both demand and supply side. This is important for all organisations but particularly ones like financial institutions with a responsibility to ensure their clients and colleagues can use their increasingly digital services.
- Economic Social Governance: digital inclusion can deliver the social value commitments in public service contracts and create a strong foundation for change.
We co-created Inspire with Capgemini. As a tech-based organisation they knew they had a responsibility to tackle the digital divide and had always offered digital volunteering opportunities. But they realised their digitally-savvy staff often didn't understand the scale and depth of the issue. Inspire has been instrumental in:
- Raising awareness of digital inclusion, helping staff understand digital literacy as something everyone can contribute to via networks they already have.
- Providing a foundation for a wider volunteering programme helping everyone from beginners to coders.
- Scaling up volunteering commitments in a way that fits into busy diaries.
- Engaging staff and improving soft skills, like active listening.
They started with a handful of volunteers and now have more than 1500 registered users. The next evolution is to maximise the impact of volunteer pledges, and scale up the programme with Champions helping co-workers to be Inspire-d.
We’re using Inspire to amplify our business-wide commitment to Digital Inclusion and help our people to do something practical about it. Inspire explains the impact a lack of digital skills can have for individuals and how we can use our expertise at Capgemini to help redress the balance.
It’s motivating everyone to get involved and generating great engagement with our Digital Inclusion mission.
It’s all measurable so it’s easy for me to demonstrate impact to the rest of the business. We’ve also learned how versatile Inspire is and are now looking to share it with our clients and supply chain too.
Sally Caughey
Head of Digital Inclusion, Capgemini
Digital Inclusion and ESG
We're working for Capgemini as part of the Sellafield Six social impact programme, that empowers neighbourhoods to create transformational change. Capgemini fund a project offering free membership of the Digital Champions Network to community organisations in West Cumbria, which we co-ordinate with an on-the-ground Project Manager. Now in its second year, we have ten organisations training Champions to pass on digital skills.
All employees have five paid days of volunteering a year, but the organisation was struggling to create meaningful opportunities that met employee expectations, had impact and didn't require days of training. As the B2B arm of the business, they also wanted to align their CSR work with their aims and values.
As part of their "Connect More" programme, we started work on a pilot graduate project that's evolved into a volunteering scheme that's being rolled out across the business.
They use Inspire as a foundation that underlies their inclusion piece, completed online or delivered via group sessions.
Employees can volunteer to help friends and family, or deepen their commitment by joining the Digital Champion's Network and volunteering in the community.
Virgin Media O2 Business co-ordinate employee volunteering opportunities, using connections to clients and the community.
Working closely together, we've supported them to:
- Raise awareness of the issues and build skills capability in staff so they can confidently help others with digital skills.
- Create a successful, flexible and scaleable employee volunteer programme in under a year...
- Which is aligned to the values of their employees and their business goals.
- Strengthen their ties to community and to clients via genuinely impactful volunteering
The initiative by Virgin Media O2 Business is both on trend and unusual. Nearly all service providers in the UK offer their staff volunteering days, but this is more focused than many ‘me too’ digital inclusion announcements.
Being a good corporate citizen is now seen as a key element of corporate behaviour and strategy, so offering substantial volunteering support for UK local authorities and the public sector makes sense… Digital skills support initiatives are key elements of ESG. Virgin Media O2Business’ approach looks to differentiate itself in this market
Global Data
November 2022
The UK's largest long term savings and retirement business. We're working on a wide-reaching programme to upskill colleagues and customers. To date, we've delivered:
- A pilot of Inspire with a test cohort from the across business and a fresh iteration of content and design functionality of the training course.
- Bespoke Digital Champion content for staff in customer facing teams, delivered via the Digital Champions Network.
- A Community Learning Event at their head office, where Digital Champions supported community learners with digital skills.
- Launch of the Standard Life Digital Skills Hub which integrates our tech guides, with user testing of concept by the brilliant Community Clear Web.
NFU Mutual is a long-established, award winning insurance company specialising in the rural and farming sector. It has embarked on a journey to offer customers a range of digital self-service options to complement its existing channels, meet customer expectations and make doing business easier.
- Business drivers: streamlining business processes, response to customer demand for digital.
- ESG drivers: reduce carbon footprint, promote digital inclusion for stakeholders
We are in the early stages of developing a programme which includes:
- Flexible strategic support to develop digital inclusion and skills capacity through an iterative approach.
- A logic model and evaluation framework to underpin the aims of the programme, identifying beneficiaries and establishing measures of success.
- Content development to align Inspire-style digital inclusion training more closely to NFU Mutual’s business and organisational model.
As a pioneer in health care, improving outcomes for patients is core to Roche’s purpose and they want to address the unmet needs of diverse patients and communities by working on advancing inclusive research and health equity.
Digital inclusion is a key component of promoting better health outcomes and we’re supporting Roche in a pilot phase to test out a Champion approach by:
- Providing first-step digital inclusion awareness training through Inspire.
- Providing second level, CPD accredited training on the Digital Champions Network for colleagues who can commit to digital skills volunteering in the community.
- Matching their Champion volunteering capacity with digital health focussed volunteering opportunities with our public and community sector clients.
Essential Digital Skills for Work
Working in Public Private Partnerships
