Are you developing training programmes to help accelerate digital transformation? For inspiration, read about how PwC UK developed the skills of change agents to support its firmwide transformation.

PwC is one of the brilliant Princess Royal Training Award recipients of 2021. They created a community of problem solvers to leverage technology, helping to solve their clients’ most important problems and delivering on PwC’s strategic priorities. To achieve this they needed to upskill their people and invest in the digital skills of all their employees.

Some 1 in 10 of 22,000 people applied to join a new network of “Digital Accelerator” change agents, which has now grown to 500 people. 

The programme is all about driving improvements and enabling this team to encourage colleagues to opt into the digital mindset and develop their skills, as part of wider transformation and culture change, all while continuing their day jobs.

The result? By sharing everything they’ve learned about using digital tools with their teams, they’re helping drive a collaborative digital culture and their teams are bringing new tech-powered solutions to transform client delivery and their internal projects.

What did the programme look like?

• Initial immersive face-to-face ‘Lift Off’ event in October 2019 placed these change agents in a fast-paced and challenging learning environment which used internal and external experts, as well as actors, to simulate the challenges they would face in the business
• Touchpoint events throughout the year to give the opportunity to re-engage, reflect and share experiences. These encouraged teams to follow the Innovation Framework before submitting their ideas
• Badges were awarded for completing formal digital upskilling learning
• PwC catered for different learning styles and individual needs with a varied programme including face-to-face, virtual classroom, self-paced learning and team challenges
• Regular pre and post-training surveys to measure the expectations of the learner and the success of the programme

Have you developed change agents in the past? How did it go?