Background

We were commissioned to design and conduct a LNA for 11 different health and social care organisations, employing between them, in excess of 32,000 staff, to determine their Information and Communication Technology (ICT) learning needs.

What we did

We established a project group with representatives from each organisation, to agree the approach to the project and identify the roles and responsibilities of each project member during the project.

In discussing the approach we found that the participating organisations had significant problems in getting staff to attend training courses and experienced high levels of “non-attenders”.  We felt that added value could be gained by not only surveying staff about their skills but also by exploring with them the barriers and constraints they experienced with regard to ICT and ICT training.

Owing to the lack of access to IT for many staff (the first barrier identified!), we used a paper-based questionnaire to a sample of staff in each organisation.  The sample size varied from 33%-100% depending on the size of each organisation and the size of each staff group.  Questionnaires were addressed personally to staff and issued with a covering letter from their Chief Executive or Director of HR.

Individual interviews were also held with Senior Managers and Clinicians and we held open focus group sessions for staff in each organisation to obtain anecdotal data about the availability and use of ICT, about existing training and development provision, and to provide an opportunity to raise any other issues or problems encountered. 

How we helped

From the analysis of  returned questionnaires we were able to help each organisation to understand more clearly the current level of skills for each of the different staff groups employed and identify the type and levels of training that would be required to bring staff to the levels of skill that would be needed in the future.  This enabled them to develop a clear, prioritised training plan and identify the levels of investment required.

In addition, we discovered that the timing and length of training sessions offered did not fit with the availability and time constraints of many of the key staff groups.  As a result we recommended a “pick and mix” approach to training, offering staff the options of tutor-led short sessions, computer-based learning packages and, in certain cases, individual tuition.  The training staff re-vamped their training schedules and reduced session times to 2 hours.  This freed-up time for them to provide more training either in the training centre or within the workplace itself.  In addition, a range of computer-based learning packages were purchased and made available through the intranet site.