What's next for the Digital Champions Programme?

The Digital Champions Programme was our flagship programme and is designed to support senior leaders from across the Scottish public and third sectors. Leaders have a commitment to deliver on Scotland’s National Performance Framework and digital is a key enabler in driving the realisation of these outcomes. The programme aimed to enable participants to champion and develop transformation and their digital agenda within their organisations and across the wider public sector and to develop their confidence in leading in a digital world. The  pandemic disruption has changed the way most organisations work and we need a programme that will support Scottish public sector leadership to meet the ongoing challenges.

Since its inception in 2013, the programme has been prepared and delivered through varying degrees of partnership and more than 300 public sector leaders have now completed it. The last official review, in 2019, showed that 80% of participants rated the programme very good or excellent.

The time is now right to consider the next iteration of the programme, which will further evolve to include themes that are commensurate with the world in which we now work. The Digital Leadership Programme maintains the legacy of Digital Champions but provides more opportunity to explore challenges and opportunities to improve organisational and public digital services. The Scottish Digital Academy is now working with TXP Impact (previously known as Future Gov) to design and deliver the next programme.

The next intake for this programme will be through nominations and an open application process, it is expected to consist of around 20 individuals within the cohort. The programme normally runs over several weeks, with five one day sessions. The programme duration and timetable will be subject to government pandemic guidance and will be released in January 2022.