Organisational capability

Integral to our success is the investment we are making in digital transformation. This involves replacing legacy databases with modern cloud-based systems, embedding new outsourced IT management, and optimising available technologies.

Our organisational capability is also about looking beyond the lifetime of our strategy, making sure we are progressing towards our vision and greater outcomes for all – such as our environmental responsibility.

This year we completed a significant aspect of our digital transformation by implementing a new database to help us operate more efficiently, improve our data handling processes and strengthen relationships and communications.

Lara’s story

Lara Osborne began a secondment from her role as Live Music Coordinator for the North of England to Change Engagement Lead in 2023.

Building on this work, the secondment developed into People and Culture Lead from April 2024. Lara worked on supporting staff through our digital transformation, launched an eLearning platform for our staff and musicians, led reviews on HR processes and supported the Staff Engagement team to organise social events.

“My work areas included Change and Engagement, Learning and Development, and HR Policies and Practices. We successfully moved to our new CRM and engaged staff with the change over the course of the project. The main challenge was catering to the specific needs of all of our staff. Conducting a change readiness survey helped with this and the results gave us direction on what focus and areas of support were needed to ensure all staff were as ready as possible ahead of our launch date.

It was important to have staff involved early on, and through internal communications we were able to keep that engagement through different channels such as written posts shared on our intranet, presentations at all team meetings, and relaxed drop-ins for staff to come along and ask questions or provide suggestions on what other support they need, which worked well.

Launching the eLearning platform and having so many musicians and staff complete their training was another success. Finding the right support for such a diverse and large audience was important to ensure everyone was able to complete their training. This was done through text, video and a drop-in support session.

During this secondment opportunity, I have been able to grow my confidence by leading on several new projects and exercise some of the skills from the change management training I completed. It’s been great to work with and learn from different members of the team and attend conferences online and in-person to learn more about topics such as inclusivity, engaging communications, staff development, and more.”

Highlights

Completed the move to our new CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system, Beacon.

This included the cleansing and migration of data to the new system and developing a web application to support the process of matching musicians to events.

Trialled an online eLearning platform for staff and musician training.

100% of staff completed safeguarding, data protection and health and safety training.

76% of staff also attended a ‘Productivity Ninja’ refresher workshop with an external agency.

Scoped options for a cloud-based media library to enable staff across the charity to access high quality photography and videos

that represents the diverse communities we work with.

Retired our existing network server drives, replacing them with a cloud‑based storage solution for

improved security and efficiency across the charity.

Began a project to design and build a new website with improved user journeys, Search Engine Optimisation, accessibility and communication of impact and strategy information.

Took significant steps to address our environmental impact,

such as reducing our use of paper and need for a physical space through our digital transformation and introducing energy saving practices in our Scotland office.