FAQs about Inspire

What is Inspire?

Inspire is a quick, interactive training course that unpacks digital inclusion for a wide audience. 

How does it work?

The core offering is simple. Inspire is based around a bite-size, interactive e-learning course. It unpacks digital inclusion and the importance of digital skills. Learners are galvanised to make a specific pledge to help someone they know with a digital skill.  This simple action brings home the reality and importance of digital inclusion.

What kind of organisations use it?

Inspire was initially created for corporates and lots of our clients are from the private sector, with an interest in promoting digital inclusion, either for clients, colleagues or beneficiaries in the wider community. For example, we work with financial institutions who want to make sure that digital inclusion is embedded across their company and that as they become increasingly digital-first, they don't leave colleagues and clients behind; we work with digital consultancy firms who want a CSR offering that builds on skills employees already have, in a sector to which they already feel a connection. You can find out more about how it's used by corporates for social good. 

An increasing number of public and third sector organisations want to use Inspire too. It's usually not for staff in full-on client-facing roles who usually do more in-depth training on the Digital Champions Network, but it's an effective way to get everyone to understand why digital inclusion matters and how it can impact their role and affect their organisation.

Inspire is often part of a broader digital inclusion strategy, the first step in journey to find new digitally inclusive ways to operate. We've found that though Inspire is ready-to-go, every company we work with wants to use it differently and maximise its impact in line with their strategy. Part of our initial discussions with you will be about how to best implement it to meet your goals.

How much does it cost?

Our prices depend on the kind of organisation you are, and the size and complexity of your project and the amount of support your want. Here's our price list. 

Inspire training and resources

What do people learn and how?

Inspire is an online course. It takes around an hour to complete and is interactive, bite-sized and builds on our award-winning expertise creating training courses. The course unpacks the issues around digital inclusion, explaining what it is, how it can impact people and what the crucial digital skills are. It looks at successful approaches to helping someone learn something new. Employees then go onto to complete their pledge.

How is it delivered?

Inspire can be completed in two main ways.

• Online, as self-directed learning, at the learner's own pace and at a time and place that suits them. This takes about 40 minutes.
• As a workshop with group discussions and targeted and tailored reflection. This can be delivered online or in person. It can be done in under an hour but many organisations like to take more time.  We can deliver this for you or provide full notes/ resources for it to be delivered in-house.

In both versions, learners make their pledge online and can return to the  learning online as many times as they like for a year. 

Some companies use a mixture of delivery methods, depending on who is doing the course and when. Some use a cascade model, where Inspire "graduates" go on to run the workshops themselves. 

What kind of pledges do people make?

Pledges are usually focused round friends, family and sometimes colleagues. Some pledgers help out in their local community, at schools or libraries or in community groups. But most like to start small and close to home. Here are some examples...

What are the benefits of this kind of volunteering?

People can learn and volunteer in a way that's convenient for them at a time and place that suits them, which is especially important if they have demanding jobs.

Volunteering like things brings home the fact that we ALL know people who struggle with digital skills and the depth and scale of the problem. It shows them how doing something small can make a big digital difference to someone else - and they can swiftly see the tangible benefits of their actions.

Some of employees go on to complete training on the Digital Champions Network and help in structured community programmes. Others enjoy putting pledges into action so much, they go onto make repeated pledges. 

This kind of volunteering can also improve soft skills in all sorts of ways - from active listening to people management. And depending on how you run it, it can be a great way to strengthen connections across the organisation, at different levels and in different business units. Or it can help with other learning, for example, we have physiotherapy students who use it as part of the Equality, Diversity and Inclusion training and in their placements.

What are the benefits for an organisation?

Once digital inclusion is embedded in an organisation, people also begin to recognise new opportunities to create products and services that are truly inclusive, efficient (and sometimes profitable!). Truly inclusive organisations have..

• Happy customers and service users who can confidently use digital services and who feel that the organisation is listening to them.
• Happy staff and/or volunteers who have the skills they need to do their jobs and to help their customers & co-workers. 
• A healthy bottom line: there are huge returns in having digitally confident customers and colleagues. 

Project planning & management support

How do we get started?

Before we start, we'll work with you to ensure you get the most out of Inspire, and can roll it out to maximum effect. We'll talk through how it aligns with your wider digital inclusion strategy and see if you need anything else in place to make it work. For example, you might want to look at adapting the content for a specific audience or help drawing up an implementation road-map, aligned to your CSR goals and backed up by a recruitment plan.

We find that quite often, companies come to us with one key driver but that this evolves and changes over time. There's more about these drivers here and how a digital inclusion programmes support CSR strategies. 

What customisation is there?

We tailor the version of Inspire that your people see with your logo, welcome message and call to action on competing the course. The platform has built-in automatic email reminders to encourage volunteers along the way and remind them of what they need to do next.

We can also create or adapt e-learning content for your specific audience and some clients want a version of Inspire that is delivered via their own platform and written specifically within the context of their organisation. We have some standard customisations we can offer you - and we're always happy to explore new ways to adapt Inspire.  

How do you manage and evaluate an on-going project?

The course stimulates employee volunteering in a way you can evidence. A comprehensive management dashboard gives your Project Managers access to data and downloadable reports on all aspects of your programme, including registrations, pledges and learning journey completions.

We'll set up the dashboard with all your reporting data and run on-boarding sessions, as well as providing reporting templates to get your Project Managers up to speed. If necessary, we can provide a bespoke monitoring and evaluation framework, which we can create at set-up, and we can gather and analyse data for you. 

What set-up and on-going support is there?

As well as customisation, dashboards and Project Manager onboarding, we'll also provide a full user manual on getting the most from Inspire. 

Beyond that, you can then choose the level of set-up and on-going support you need. We strongly recommend you use our client management support as you roll-out and grow the programme. This gives you regular strategic insight and support from our delivery team and CEO, with weekly, monthly or quarterly calls as necessary. 

We find that our clients are usually passionate about digital inclusion and how their projects are evolving. We run regular sessions where they come together to share ideas and learn from each other and you'll be very welcome to come along.