Between May and June 2025, you might remember being invited to complete our annual membership check-in survey.
The goal? To better understand your experiences, how you’re benefitting from your membership, and what we can do to support you more effectively. It was our first survey in two years, so we revised the questions and made it open to all.
We’re grateful to everyone who took part earlier this year. Your feedback ensures Socitm evolves – informed by you, for you.
Now, after a busy couple of months for me which have included, not only analysing the survey, but:
- Publishing the final digital twins briefing in our 3-part series
- Updating AI@Socitm with lots of new case studies and guidance
- Presenting about AI governance in the local public sector at the Major Cities of Europe conference in Paris
- Working hard to update our sample generative AI usage policy document (stay tuned for when version two gets published)
I can finally update you on the survey findings and what we’ve been doing to address your feedback!
Demographics: who responded?
We received responses from members across the UK, the majority of which were from English councils with strong representation from:
- Regions: the East and West Midlands, London and the South East, and the South West
- Roles: digital/transformation (49%), operational IT (35%), and senior management (29%)
What you told us
1. Account usage
58% of you don’t access your user account on socitm.net
Logging into your Socitm account is the place to start. It’s the only way to access all your benefits and essential details about your membership package.
How to start
- Log in
- Select ‘Membership details’ to view everything your organisation can access.
Membership benefits are revised yearly; the 2026 membership benefits packages will be updated in your user account from January 2026.
2. What you like best/know the most about
1. Webinars
2. Local meetings
3. President's Conference
4. National conferences
5. Microsoft's Change Agent course
Webinars, local meetings and President’s Conference, national conferences and Microsoft change agent course topped the list for our members as your most favourite services.
Webinars were most popular owing to timely, relevant topics. You also valued networking and knowledge sharing at events. And requested more reminders about upcoming sessions.
Get even more involved
- Come along to a live webinar; sessions are open to all, held regularly, and recordings are available on-demand for members unable to attend. They cover a wide range of topics, including AI, cyber security, social value in procurement, local government reorganisation, and more.
We also host member-exclusive webinars on resilience, influencing, teamwork, and change management. - High engagement with the Microsoft Change Agent course aligns with members’ roles across transformation, innovation, change, business analysis, and service management. Members have also requested more support for Microsoft products like Power BI, Power Automate and Copilot.
- Attend local meetings (online or in person) and meet members in your region to network, share best practice, navigate challenges, and hear from relevant suppliers. Socitm also attend to update what we’ve been working on and what’s upcoming.
- Look out for the next annual President’s Conference taking place in 2026. You can read all about what we got up to in June 2025.
- We also hold national conferences in England, Northern Ireland and Wales.
3. What you like least/know the least about
1. Digital Twins and Connected Places (in the resource hub)
2. Place Insight by Impera Analytics
3. Website accessibility testing
4. Workshops and roundtables
5. Socitm Nations and Regions Forum (NRF)
This showed us that we need to be better at shouting more about these services and why they are useful, especially as some of them are newer offers or have recently been revised.
What are they?
Digital Twins and Connected Places
Explore our research and policy, including the Digital Twins briefing series for public sector services, and Connected Places, focused on building stronger, tech-enabled communities. Find more in our resource hub.
Place Insight
Impera Analytics’ data platform is available to you at a discount. It provides you with detailed, regularly updated insights into England’s population and local areas using multi-year datasets. The tool helps track trends and identify opportunities across economic, health, and census themes, supporting evidence-based planning and benchmarking. Read about its impact in councils like yours.
Website accessibility testing
Socitm partners with Silktide to help you keep on top of online accessibility with a detailed and user-friendly service. Take advantage of this sample test of your main domained website, along with a sample of pdfs. The automated assessment returns actions to help you develop the best possible experience for your users, as well as complying with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG).
To supplement your website accessibility, complete a digital accessibility maturity self-assessment (DAMA) from our partner, Hassell Inclusion, based on the standard for digital accessibility, ISO 30071-1.
Workshops and roundtables
It’s not just webinars in the online events schedule. You also have access to more research and policy roundtables, held with our partners on topics like social value in procurement and local government reorganisation. We’re open to new topic suggestions for future sessions.
Socitm Nations and Regions Forum (NRF)
The Socitm NRF is an independent policy advisory group for our board. Its members come from UK regional and national committees, trustees, and key public and third sector partners. Meeting quarterly, it works to shift public service organisations toward integrated, place-based models. And explores how Digital, Data, and Technology (DDaT) can drive innovation and better outcomes for communities. To join, email socitmnrf@socitm.net.
4. Learning and development
You're happy with our training courses but would like continued reminders of what's available.
Get more involved
- The Leadership Academy featuring courses on Top Talent, Empowering Women, Place-based Leadership, Managing and Motivating Hybrid Teams, How to Be an Effective Coach, and An Introduction to Emotional Intelligence.
- Volunteer for the mentoring programme.
- Also keep an eye on our calendar or the newsletter (which you should receive via email) for the next available training courses.
- Members also asked for the opportunity to develop a bespoke learning and development. This year we’ve provided personalised training and look forward to doing more with you in 2026.
5. Research and policy
You found the most value in Digital Trends, AI@Socitm, case studies, Cyber@Socitm and the sample generative AI usage policy.
But you also told us you’d like more participant-led research, general audience targeting in publications, and guidance on current priorities like AI ethics and its environmental impact, digital accessibility and support for local government reorganisation and case studies on digital solutions, large transformation projects or system implementations.
Digital Trends is our annual flagship report and shaped by our President’s team. In preparation for 2026 we asked you to help shape its direction and focus. We distributed a survey and collected feedback at September’s NRF. You told us your priorities are AI and data, cyber security, ways of working and digital inclusion. Keep your eyes peeled from January 2026 as we start to roll out guidance on these topics. Want to get involved in one or more of these? Email senior research analyst, Diana Rebaza, at diana.rebaza@socitm.net.
AI@Socitm and Cyber@Socitm are there to help you better implement AI responsibly and to improve your cyber posture. They’re updated regularly with new research and guidance, case studies, events, webinars and training, and to signpost you to sector groups and networks.
We also feature case studies across various topics such as AI, data, cyber security and innovation on the resource hub. We’verecently revised our approach to case studies to make it easier for you to submit yours to us!
We have also updated AI@Socitm with new case studies covering AI training and awareness, AI to detect potholes and traffic offences, AI-powered chatbots and digital front doors, flood resilience with AI, planning tools improved by AI, community and citizen informed AI governance, AI council tax and HR assistants and much more!
6. Benchmarking
Nearly half of our respondents were unaware of our benchmarking service when asked if they’d considered using it in the past 3 years.
Time and resource constraints were the biggest barriers to participation, so you were offered a single benchmarking module free of charge in 2025. This was also a response to feedback that you’d like more support to manage change during difficult financial circumstances.
Our benchmarking service allows you to compare the performance of your IT service across areas ranging from cost efficiency, service and project delivery, through to user satisfaction and general IT literacy. It attracts organisations who are keenly interested in improving the services they provide.
Find out more about benchmarking and how it benefits our members, or contact our technical consultant, Matthew Fraser, at matthew.fraser@socitm.net.
7. Communications
Your most preferred ways to get membership information are email (41%), newsletter (17%), events (16%) and Microsoft Teams (14%).
You also let us know that we should go beyond emails to make it clearer what the member benefits are. We have improved communication about our services and resources through various channels, including more visibility presenting to members’ senior leadership teams about membership benefits and across the sector at events and in newsletters.
Sign up to our members’ weekly newsletter if you’re not getting it already.
Thank you again for your insights and support.
If you’d like to shape next year’s survey – or you have any more feedback or questions – please get in touch with me at yasmine.hajji@socitm.net