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Socitm, the professional association for digital leaders in local public services, has launched the registration process for its most far-reaching and comprehensive leadership development portfolio.

The association’s highly successful Leadership Academy offers a full programme of courses to help a wide range of people who work in and with public sector organisations acquire the skills and competencies that make exceptional digital leaders.

Socitm has partnered with IT and business skills training group QA to run the academy programmes from 2019. To date, the academy has seen over 200 professionals from the public sector complete its inspirational programmes – helping to shape and enable tomorrow’s leaders to realise their capabilities.

In response to this success, and by incorporating programme places into its corporate membership, Socitm is aiming to extend this learning and development opportunity to over 200 people a year.

Three programmes are currently available: Empowering Women in a Digital World (EWDW), aimed at aspiring female leaders predominantly from the public sector; Senior Leaders, a new one-day workshop focusing on the challenges facing today’s IT senior leaders; and Top Talent, which offers participants vital insight into how to be more effective through developing their leadership skills.

Designed for people from all backgrounds and with different experience levels, the programmes aim to increase participants’ self-awareness, helping them guide their behaviours and instinctive responses towards more productive outcomes.

Nadira Hussain, director of leadership development and research at Socitm, said: “The academy will continue to provide expertise and support to help the leaders we have now. At the same time it will support the development of a new generation of digital leaders. They will steer public services into a future which builds on existing strengths and adds new ones, championing leadership, inclusion, equality and diversity, and encouraging innovation.

“The academy will give current and future leaders all the tools, techniques, support and behaviours to help them engage and enable their staff to work more effectively and efficiently, as well as continually improving standards and service delivery for the communities that we serve.

“’With change at a scale and pace the public sector has never seen before, the fundamental difference between success and failure is the calibre of leadership.”

Mark Godfrey, Director of Marketing at QA Learning, said: “The digital skills gap is not going away and we would encourage all public sector leaders to register with the academy and learn the digital leadership skills and gain the competencies that will enable them to steer their way through the rapidly changing digital landscape. The Leadership Academy programmes are a must for leaders that aim to make a positive impact in the digital age.”

More information about the programmes, including how to register, is available here.