We are growing modern capability and skills in the public sector, so people have the confidence, skills, capacity and capability to deliver better public services in their role and organisation.
This year, we focused on upskilling the Welsh public sector by delivering:
- digital and Agile training
- cyber security awareness training in partnership with the Cyber Resilience Centre for Wales
- service design training in partnership with The School of Good Services
- a series of webinars on artificial intelligence
Training we delivered
- Digital and Agile: the foundations
- Agile fundamentals for teams
- Agile fundamentals for leaders
In the first term (September 2023 to December 2023), we trained 199 people from 8 organisations with 48 people attending more than 2 courses.
In the second term (January 2024 to March 2024), we trained 317 people from 19 organisations with 21 people attending more than 2 courses.
Hear from our attendees
“Facilitators made the course interesting and kept everybody engaged – good mixture of written text and information and tasks. NO DEATH BY POWERPOINT!”
“Good overview of Agile and really prompted me to think about my role and my team and how we might implement some change.”
“Great interactive course, well-paced, knowledgeable trainers and loved the interactive element.”
Lunch and learns
This year, we ran 2 lunch and learn series (30-minute interactive webinars) which focused on user-centred design, digital and Agile topics. We had 244 people register for the series from 88 organisations.
After the 8 webinars were published to YouTube, they received a total of 1279 views.
View our lunch and learn playlist
Cyber security awareness training
Our cyber security awareness training in partnership with the Cyber Resilience Centre for Wales had 79 bookings from organisations including Wales Council for Voluntary Action, Careers Wales, Welsh Language Commissioner, Cyngor Sir Ceredigion County Council, Education Workforce Council, Future Generations Commissioner for Wales, Newid Cymru and Llais Wales.
Service design training in partnership with The School of Good Services
This training had 8 leaders attend from 8 organisations including Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board, Velindre University NHS Trust, Social Care Wales, Welsh Government, Natural Resources Wales, Rhondda Cynon Taf County Borough Council, Welsh Blood Service, and the Welsh Revenue Authority.
Hear from our attendees
“The biggest take away from the training – the importance of the discovery phase and really understanding the user needs before jumping into solutions. What I hope to do differently as a result of attending – looking at the projects for this year, taking a step back and really understanding the issues users are telling us about and what their needs are before considering solutions.”
“This training really helped me see how good service design is something that everyone in the organisation should consider as we work through our daily job, regardless of role as our customers are our focus. I feel that I can now offer more advice to colleagues and challenge areas where I feel we could improve. I’m also about to read the Good Services book to keep on learning! The course gave me insights which those who haven’t attended may not share – hopefully, there will be more opportunities for others to take part in the learning.”
“We’re transitioning to becoming a service-orientated organisation, and the training gave me lots of food for thought. I think most importantly it helped me have some of the tools and language needed to have conversations with others in the organisation about what becoming service orientated might look and feel like, and to help me understand the things we needed to do as we move along that journey. Following the training we’re keen to involve the whole organisation in discussing what this looks and feels like, to help shape this. There will be challenges along the way, and knowing where to start on some of this will be one of the hardest initial things, but we are excited about it too! One of the first things we hope to do is further embed our user-centred focus across the organisation.”
“The service design training course provided by Good Services was a comprehensive and engaging experience. As a result of the course, we will implement several strategic improvements to drive forward the council's agenda for user-centred design and foster a culture of customer involvement in service change within the organisation. We will ensure that our project lifecycle prioritises user research and feedback to inform the design process.”
“For the Hwb team, having access to the Agile and service design training has been a fantastic resource and has allowed the wider division to become familiar with user-centred design and the importance of this when designing digital services. We hope to secure further training in the future, which will help strengthen skills in other DDaT areas such as; delivery management. I am keeping my fingers crossed for this!”
Next steps
Over the next financial year, we will continue to deliver courses and training to the Welsh public sector. One of our next steps is to digitise our current digital and Agile courses so that people can learn at their own pace, therefore training more people.
We will also be running a user research fundamentals course, which has been developed by psychologist David Travis, author of 'Think Like a UX Researcher' and will be delivered by us.
We will also be running a digital leaders programme as part of our training offering.
Our next series of webinars will focus on what good looks like in the public sector, which will include case studies on digital transformation.
Read more
Changes to our digital and Agile courses
Support and advice to fill public sector digital, data, and technology (DDaT) roles
How it meets our objectives
CDPS objectives:
Objective 1: Supporting the leadership and culture amongst public service leaders to drive good digital policy making and support digital transformation.
Objective 2: Support others to ensure that people can access digital public services by helping them create services that are designed around user needs.
Objective 3: Work with others to develop a digital workforce strategy for public services in Wales and support practical measures to create a pipeline of skilled professionals.
The Five Ways of Working – Well-being of Future Generations Act
- Long-term
- Integration
- Involvement
- Collaboration
- Prevention
7 well-being goals – Well-being of Future Generations Act
- A prosperous Wales
- A more equal Wales
- A Wales of more cohesive communities
- A Wales of vibrant culture and thriving Welsh language