Professional services staff digital experience insights survey 2020/21 - UK higher education findings

The future of how and where we work

In one sense, this data is unique in that all of us who have worked from home in these last two years can relate to the findings. In another sense, the findings have much broader relevance because our graduates will be going into employment in similar roles beyond education and across a wide gamut of industries.

The findings, ongoing research and experiences, will continue to push us forward in our understanding of the future of work and identify some key considerations as new hybrid models emerge for where and how we work most effectively and how the physical space available can be best utilised.

This is the third in our series of reports looking at the digital experiences across higher education throughout the ongoing global COVID-19 pandemic. Previously, we have looked at the experiences of students (pdf) and of teaching staff (pdf) and we now have data from the professional services staff. These staff perform a wide variety of roles across our universities; some, like librarians, directly linked to the daily activities of supporting students, teaching and learning, and some who undertake a wide variety of other roles, for example in finance, IT, data, administration and estates management.

Many of the professional services staff in universities will not have previously had an opportunity to work from home, and few would have chosen to make such a transition at short notice and with limited time to prepare – the fact that they did so efficiently and with minimal disruption to business is testament to their professionalism.

Broadly speaking, the experience was positive for staff and offered flexibility and some benefits to work/life balance, something many staff would like to see continue. Staff were pragmatic about aspects of the experience that were less positive, and constructive in their suggestions for how this can be improved.

Key themes

The surveys covered four key areas:

• Theme one: you and your technology
  Establishing how and where staff were working and whether they had experienced any problems
• Theme two: digital platforms and services at your organisation
  Looking at how well professional services staff felt their organisation supported them with the technology they needed to work remotely, and how effectively the organisation communicated with them, facilitated collaboration online and to what extent organisations involved professional services staff in decision-making about online working
• Theme three: technology in your work
  Exploring how technology has been used whilst working online, the range of work activities and the overall quality of support for online and remote working
• Theme four: your digital development
  How well supported did professional services staff feel in getting to grips with remote working? What guidance and opportunities were professional services staff offered to develop their digital skills?