#BeMoreDigital Virtual Conference 2021: recap of day three

Well, that flew by!

 

Today was the final day of the 2021 #BeMoreDigital Conference. Our first fully virtual annual conference broke attendance records, as users from charities around the country joined us for a programme of digital learning comprising twenty webinars and four workshops. We even made our first foray into virtual networking, which was a great success.

 

Here’s our recap of the day’s highlights.

 

The third and final day of the #BeMoreDigital Conference 2021 kicked off with a welcome video featuring Charity Digital CEO, Jonathan Chevallier.

 

Jonathan recapped the last two days of the conference and introduced the two streams for the day – Digital Service Delivery & Operations and Digital Fundraising.

 

Then our hosts for the day, Charity Digital’s Chris Hall and Lisa Chomette, took the reins and kicked off the day’s sessions.

 

 

Digital Service Delivery & Operations

 

The first session of the day in this stream was ‘Building a digital strategy to innovate, automate and accelerate’ – sponsored by Phoenix. Andrea Cowell (Account Manager at Phoenix Software) was joined by Trevor Kerr (Head of Digital at Together Trust) for a discussion of digital transformation.

 

This webinar explored building a new digital strategy from scratch during a pandemic and getting people set up with the basic digital tools they need for remote working and service delivery.

 

Phoenix gave an overview of the obstacles they’ve seen the sector face and what lies ahead. They explored a charity case study to find out how Together Trust used digital solutions to move their services online during the pandemic. The session explored the many facets of transformation that charities need to consider, such as security, user adoption, productivity, automation and cost optimisation.

 

One of the key takeaways from the sessions is that there is no set pace for this process. Transformation sometimes happens slowly. It is important to be aware of the needs of the people you are asking to change their processes and to be flexible and make allowances to accommodate them. Trevor shared the story of how ¾ of the staff at one of Together Trust’s residential properties became ill with COVID-19 at the same time. When emergency situations like this arise, it is not the time to start asking people to change their processes and ways of working!

The session also explored the importance of making sure your processes and platforms are fully-integrated and working well together.

 

The next session in this stream was ‘Is digital working for you, or are you working for digital?’ - a webinar on digital service delivery delivered by Julie Bishop (Director at the Law Centres Network).

 

When building a programme of digital service delivery, it’s important to prioritise the needs of your service users and staff. With so many options for splashy new tech, it’s easy to get caught up in the excitement. But taking a step back and reviewing your data and processes is the best way to make digital work for you and your service users, rather than the other way around.

 

The Law Centres Network are several years into a digital transformation journey. This session recapped this journey and shared their learning and experience.

 

The problem they were facing was that their digital infrastructure was outdated. This was compounded by the fact that while funding was down, user expectations were higher than ever before.

 

They learned that digital transformation is about leveraging the power of a digital framework across an organisation to learn and to think again. They were able to refashion processes and services based on what service users and staff reported would work best for them.

 

In this way, they adopted a people-first approach to digital transformation. They identified problems that needed solving and built up from there. They learned that any solution they developed should be simple and easy enough to use for anyone with a working knowledge of digital to pick it up and get started. The Law Centres Network resolved to use third party tools and software, make as much as possible reusable, and only develop new solutions where necessary.

 

After a short break, we were joined by long-time Charity Digital collaborator and audience favourite, Cub Llewelyn Davies (Charity Sector Lead) for the NCSC’s session ‘GDPR three years on: where is the sector at now?’

 

GDPR was the hot topic in the sector and beyond when it came into effect several years ago. Three years down the line, this session explored what it means for the sector, and what charities need to do in order to keep their data secure?

 

The National Cyber Security Centre presented their GDPR Security Outcomes, written jointly with the ICO. These outcomes were designed to help you to understand whether you are still taking appropriate measures to secure your data.

 

Cub shared a lot of valuable learning in this session. He reiterated the importance of having processes in place to manage data at all stages of its journey. This includes not ignoring the human element behind the majority of data breaches. Sometimes people leaving an organisation under difficult circumstances may take data with them. This risk needs to be mitigated and planned for.

 

He also covered the important role that technology plays in keeping data secure. Identity and access control is one of the key methods of securing data. Not everyone needs access to all data – this can allow you to limit your exposure. The session also highlighted the importance of setting up automated monitoring for breaches and logins.

 

One of the key points that Cub covered was that organisations can minimise the impact of breaches by acting swiftly and decisively. Restore systems and services and learn lessons for the future. Response and recovery planning for this begins before a breach occurs so that you are ready to respond. Keep these plans up to date!

 

The next session was ‘How one charity partnership is bridging the digital divide’. This session was conducted by Helen Mee (Head of Charity Operations at The Clare Foundation) and Chris Lewis (Co-Founder, COO and Global Cancer Influencer at Your SimPal).

 

Charity partnerships were a hot topic in the sector throughout 2019, but seems to have lost some momentum to topics like digital fundraising and remote working over the course of the pandemic.

 

But in reality, partnership and collaboration between charities have never been more important, which this positive and interesting session made very clear. Helen and Chris shared their experience of working together to empower people in Buckinghamshire with digital technology, as well as how they plan to grow and scale the scheme in 2021.

 

The two organisations had similar and overlapping missions, so they were able to work together. They empowered digitally excluded service users with devices (smartphones with 6-month pre-paid sims, with unlimited calls and texts) so that they could meet their basic digital needs, such as keeping in touch with friends and family and accessing vital services over platforms like WhatsApp and Zoom.

 

The pilot scheme helped the two organisations to discover what people really want from a device. They learned that a tablet may be more user-friendly for older service users with visual impairment than a smartphone.

 

It is very easy to forget, on a day like today when we come together virtually, that not all people in our society are so fortunate. This session raised some important questions, such as: how do you include the digitally excluded? With working and learning from home so prevalent, how do you help and connect people who have one device between a family? The work of The Clare Foundation and Your SimPal demonstrated an inspiring way forward.

 

The last session in this stream was ‘Upscaling your digital service delivery during challenging times’. This was a roundtable panel discussion, with speakers from a number of organisations. The speakers were Hannah Page (Marketing & Communications Manager at The Association of Charitable Organisations), Jessica French (Development Manager at CABA), Trudie Clements (Director at ABTA LifeLine), Aidan Jones (Chief Executive at Relate) and Li-Anne Quinn (Marketing and Communications Manager at Foothold).

 

This was a great panel to end the day on, as it covered some of the key themes of the conference. Having to rapidly upscale services during 2020 was an experience that many charities shared. Where services were once delivered face-to-face, charities had to figure out digital alternatives. Continuing to deliver their support to beneficiaries remotely was vital The Association of Charitable Organisations (ACO), which represents nearly 120 charities.

 

In this panel discussion, we heard from four charity members who all worked hard to deliver remote services this year. They discussed their varying experiences, approaches, and learnings from the process of digitisation. The panel also discussed overcoming resistance and supporting people with lower levels of tech proficiency by fostering a culture of digital support within the organisation.

 

A lot of organisations went into COVID with the question of ‘when will this end?’ at the front of their mind. There was an assumption at the beginning of lockdown that things would go back to normal quickly – now we are seeing the idea that things will never return to ‘normal’. But we have an opportunity as a sector to change things for the better.