Our partnership with the Service Design Academy

The Scottish Digital Academy supports professional learning across the public and third sectors in Scotland. Our focus remains on developing digital skills, leadership and talent. We are delighted to announce our partnership with The Service Design Academy, established by Dundee & Angus College in 2017 to address a skills shortage and the lack of accredited service design training.

Developing a skilled digital workforce across the public and third sectors will drive professional learning and training, equipping people with the skills they need to thrive in a digital world, ensuring that organisations are planning for the digital roles and services that they need now and in the future. As an early adopter of service design, Dundee & Angus College had over 40 improvement projects powered by data and driven by their expertise with the simple but compelling goal to take the College from Good to Great. The success of this project was recognised in 2018 with The Campbell Christie Public Service Reform Award.

The Scottish Digital Academy’s mission is to work collaboratively to secure sustained improvement in building and enhancing digital skills. By working with the Service Design Academy, we will seek to avoid duplication and enhance our own offer whilst recognising the valuable contribution that colleges in Scotland can make towards developing digital education and skills.

Effective service design is central to any successful transformation programme and to the development of digital products, public services and high quality user experiences. By working with the Service Design Academy, we can scale the positive impact that we’re already having on the public and third sectors in Scotland.

The Professional Development Award in Service Design builds service design capacity and design leadership to create a community of practitioners. It’s the only Scottish Qualification Authority accredited course in Service Design and accredited and certificated by the world’s leading authority in service design, the Service Design Network. In the past 5 years the Service Design Academy team of expert trainers and educators have supported organisations towards their vision of having dedicated teams of designers and user researchers supporting change and improvement. Service design is never restricted just to service designers and the range of customised and scheduled courses raises awareness and empowers at every level.

For more information about the Service Design Academy and the courses on offer, visit  Service Design Courses – Service Design Academy (sda.ac.uk).