Taking part in the SCVO Senior Leaders programme can help you become a winner! From winning actual awards to securing new funding, starting new projects and employing new staff.

Applications are now open for the fourth round of the programme – apply here.

Two of our actual award winners are Lifelink and Simon Community Scotland. Lifelink won Business of the Year 2018, at the Association of Scottish Business Women and were Glasgow Business Awards 2018 Finalist. Simon Community Scotland won the Herald 2017 Digital Business Awards.

As a result of participating in our Senior Leader programme 2017, Jacqui Taylor CEO of Lifelink was able to create a clear vision and enable change to deliver a digital service. Lifelink went on to win funding to employ a full time IT trainer to upskill staff and recruit Digital Gurus from within the team.

It was this approach to leadership and organisational innovation that won them the Business of the Year 2018.

Hugh Hill, Director of Services & Development at Simon Community Scotland joined our second round of leaders in 2017. After completing the programme Simon Community worked with their partner charity Streetwork (who have also been through the programme) to secure funding for a full time Digital Inclusion Programme Manager.

Other winners include, Scottish Families affected by Drugs and Alcohol (SFAD). SFAD won new funding that has enabled them to deliver a new Digital Families project.  Our Senior Leader programme inspired the new project and secured the new funding.

As a CEO Justina Murray learned that embedding digital is not an ‘extra’. Being part of the programme gave her invaluable peer support, helping Justina see what was possible and gain the confidence to go for it. It also allowed Justina to recognise that it’s OK to take a breath and think about, engage and test out your digital plans with the people who are most affected by them.

As participants in both our 2016 and 2017 Senior Leaders programme, Downs Syndrome Scotland won new ways of working and a new approach to how they do things. Back to front thinking or simply ‘managing failures’ no longer exists as they have become more agile in their approach.  Opportunities are no longer missed and staff are now better equipped test approaches and try new things out.

Downs Syndrome Scotland as a result of being part of the programme introduced a new free HR system. This free system, enabled them for the first time, to collect real time performance data. This data allowed them to highlight an area that was understaffed. As a result they secured funding and were able to recruit for a new post.

Winning Scotland Foundation won help from the Service Design team at Scottish Government, after a presentation as part of the programme.  As an organisation they knew that they needed to improve their service delivery.  Through a series of workshops the service design team worked with Winning staff to review current process and practice. This has meant the team own the solution, and they have been able to produce a more advanced digital solution that really meets their needs, rather than jump into buying an expensive new CRM system.

Want to join the winners? Take part in the SCVO Senior Leaders programme and become a winner – apply here.

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One Digital is a UK wide partnership which promotes the use of Digital Champions to support people to learn digital skills. For organisations interested in setting up their own digital inclusion project we have developed a free Toolkit, containing a range of useful information and resources.