Bournemouth and Poole College: driving digital transformation through leadership and strategy

As head of digital education and learning environments at Bournemouth and Poole College, Jason Eastwood was one of a number of colleagues involved in developing the college’s digital strategy. An initial conversation with his Jisc relationship manager introduced the digital elevation tool (DET) as a valuable starting point for this work.

A digital strategy steering group was subsequently formed, bringing together senior colleagues from across the College, including Sarah Hutchings, COO; Mark Davis, director of IT services; Gavin Shirley, director of student operations, MI and funding; Christina Hills, head of strategic projects; and Jason. Recognising that lasting digital transformation depends on leadership and collaboration as much as technology, the group worked together to shape the college’s approach and secure support across the organisation.

He said:

“With the changes we wanted to make, moving forward was all about culture. Even if we could use the tool to identify where we were, without the college’s culture supporting its use, it wouldn’t go anywhere. We needed our senior leadership team on board to actually help us drive it forward.”

Although digital was already part of the college’s wider strategy, reviewing the DET question sets and splitting them out across the team helped highlight how digital was embedded throughout the organisation. Jason and his colleagues broke the foundation areas down into five key pillars and shared the work accordingly. This helped ease initial staff concerns about the additional workload the project might bring. Clear deadlines and regular meetings to discuss findings kept everyone engaged and ensured the project remained on track.

While digital was the initial focus, the ongoing use of the tool also helped shape the college’s wider strategic direction.

“Using the DET highlighted that we weren’t as established in some areas as we had thought, and that realisation prompted us to ask wider questions about the impact of those gaps. For example, if students don’t have access to a web-based work experience platform, what alternatives are in place and how effective are they? Our work with the tool has driven us to review a range of procedures and look more closely at the processes we have in place."

Driving forward

As a direct result of using the DET, the college created a new digital strategy programme lead role to provide dedicated capacity to turn the strategy into action. Brian Kaliczynskyj was appointed to the role and now leads on driving the strategy forward, coordinating activity and maintaining momentum over the next two years.

Jason said the creation of the role has helped address one of the biggest challenges identified at the outset: ensuring there is dedicated time, resource and coordination to translate the College’s strategic ambitions into meaningful action.

Another tangible outcome was the creation of a dedicated SharePoint site to communicate with learners, alongside a shared digital resource hub for staff.

“We've got online learning resources and a community of practice where people can come and share thoughts and ideas. This came directly off the back of using the DET, and the clear message about sharing communications and resources that emerged through the process.”

Looking to the future

Jason and other members of the digital strategy steering group don’t consider the work anywhere near finished, and already have plenty planned for the college’s next steps. The team is now considering using the discovery tool to benchmark student skills, while also exploring the vision for change workshops to keep the organisation aligned with its wider strategic goals. He reiterated that his Jisc relationship manager played a key role in setting the college on its current path.

“The support from Jisc was instrumental, and getting started with the DET really identified the areas that we needed to develop. We’re now having conversations around what the vision at the end of this might look like. If we hadn’t had those initial conversations, we wouldn’t have got started the way we did, and that was crucial.”

Ultimately, Bournemouth and Poole College’s experience demonstrates the critical role  leadership plays in successful digital transformation. By engaging senior leaders from the outset and building a shared understanding of priorities, opportunities and challenges, the college strengthened its digital strategy, established a clear roadmap for change, and created lasting foundations for digital transformation across the organisation.  Sarah Hutchings, chief operating officer at the college, shared the difference the tool has made:

“The digital elevation tool has provided a framework for us to work within in setting direction for our digital strategy journey.  We engaged board members, the college executive, senior leaders, and student representatives in a current state assessment using the tool, defined our end state goals, identified immediate priorities based on gaps and agreed a three year roadmap with the board.”

Find out more

• Explore our digital capability frameworks
• Contact your relationship manager for support