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The voice of Scotland’s vibrant voluntary sector

Published by Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations

TFN is published by the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations, Mansfield Traquair Centre, 15 Mansfield Place, Edinburgh, EH3 6BB. The Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations (SCVO) is a Scottish Charitable Incorporated Organisation. Registration number SC003558.

Just do it! From the dark ages to digital champion

This feature is about 5 years old
 

Susan Smith talked to Jacqui Taylor about how she turned Lifelink into a digital pioneer

Three years ago, Jacqui Taylor was still getting to grips with Facebook, so if someone had told her by 2019 the Glasgow counselling charity she’s at the helm of would be considered a digital leader, she wouldn’t have believed them.

In 2015, two years into the job of chief executive of Lifelink, Jacqui was feeling pretty confident after leading the charity through organisational change and a rebrand, but she was worried the next big challenge to digitise the service could be beyond her.

With a background in training, she was a people person not a techy whizz kid. Looking around at colleagues at Lifelink, which was set up as Royston Stress Centre in 1992, she saw a lot of staff similar to herself.

Lifelink had grown from a community based mental health project to a major social enterprise with a turnover of nearly £2 million, supporting 8,000 clients across Glasgow and beyond.

But in 2015 staff were still using Windows XP (first released in 2001), and many of the charity’s counselling staff had no digital skills at all.

Jacqui knew though that there was potential for Lifelink to work better with digital – she just didn’t know where to start.

So, despite fears about being out of her depth she applied to the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations (SCVO) digital leaders programme, which was just launching and was designed to help third sector leaders become digital leaders.

The more my eyes were opened to the possibilities of digital, the more our plan grew

“I very quickly realised that I didn’t have to be technical, I just had to lead the change.”

Jacqui wanted to enhance the services that Lifeline offered and improve the experience for its clients. Its core work is counselling, which is delivered at locations throughout Glasgow, alongside a variety of emotional resilience group work and training programmes. Lifelink is about working with people to improve their mental wellbeing before they reach crisis point.

Why bother with digital then? Well, three years later the introduction of new internal systems, like Breathe HR, processes such as counsellors using tablets, text message appointment reminders and tele and video counselling, Jacqui can safely say digital has transformed Lifelink.

“The more my eyes were opened to the possibilities of digital, the more our plan grew,” she explains. “I got so excited about it. The board said my eyes sparkled – and I never, ever thought that would happen”.

But, while Jacqui herself was a quick convert to digital change, she knew others within the organisations were going to find it more difficult.

“When we brought in the new system and the tablets in February 2017, there was tears and tantrums,” she says. “Staff were stressed out, and our core business is stress, so we don’t want to stress out our own staff.”

So Jacqui arranged a basic digital skills survey and discovered that she had over-estimated the skills of front line workers. Counsellors weren’t in the habit of using computers at work, or home.

Jacqui sought funding from the Scottish Government funding for a year-long IT trainer post. Raj was able to do one-to-one sessions with staff who didn’t know what a tablet or an application was. He also provided group training, webinars and developed online materials to help the organisation develop.

We’ve found people listen more to someone external – it doesn’t have to be an expert. It can just be someone who has used the system before and knows the benefits. That could be from another voluntary organisation.

“There was a challenge for us in changing mindsets internally,” admits Jacqui. “People kept saying video counselling will never take off, but actually it kind of has to take off. There are more and more people reporting mental health problems all the time.

“Some of our counsellors felt it was about replacing face-to-face. It wasn’t something they had come to do in the first place and some of them were afraid of technology. I was clear that face-to-face is the gold-standard, but actually when someone’s really struggling and needing support, perhaps there’s a service that’s just good enough.”

One of the things Jacqui learned working on the SCVO programme with other third sector leaders, who came from a range of different organisations all trying to embrace digital change, was that she couldn’t do it all herself. So she looked for ways to involve other people.

“We introduced digital champions who could help lead the process and get buy-in from other members of staff,” she says. “We also brought in other people from outside. We’ve found people listen more to someone external – it doesn’t have to be an expert. It can just be someone who has used the system before and knows the benefits. That could be from another voluntary organisation.”

Digital transformation hasn’t just been convenient, it has improved client experiences, enabled Lifelink to reach more people and save money.

The charity saved £20,000 in postage and stationary in the first year of introducing an electronic appointment system.

Its did not attend (DNA) rate for counselling sessions fell from around 23% to 10% thanks to the introduction of text message appointment reminders, and its live appointment system gives it much more flexibility to fill spaces when cancellations do come in.

“The best things for us is the reduction in DNA rate because that means we can fill new appointments really quickly,” says Jacqui. “So a couple of weeks ago, someone phoned in real distress. Although our service is early intervention and prevention, we get crisis calls on a daily basis.

This person called at 10am and by 11.20 we had them in front of a therapist, because we’ve got the live system – we can see cancellations and offer those slots immediately.”

Now the challenge for the organisation is keeping on top of existing systems and making sure that they are able to find time to develop their learning. But Jacqui is confident that her newly enthused staff team are willing and able to do that. For Jacqui, embracing digital has been both a personal and organisational transformation.

“For me, this has been a real learning journey,” she says. “I thought I was being really smart early in 2016 in a meeting full of people when I was talking about ChipMunk. In my mind I was thinking, there’s something not right. Of course it was MailChimp! I laugh about it now, but at the time I was mortified.”

And her top tip for other leaders keen to take their organisation on a digital journey is take a leap of faith.

“Talk to other people who’ve been through the digital leaders programmes. There’s such a wealth of knowledge and experience. Don’t be afraid, it doesn’t have to be expensive and you don’t have to do it all yourself. Harness the experience you’ve got in the organisation. Just do it!”