Get to London for your next conference day (People make) Sustainable and Innovative Places on Thursday 10 October
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Newsletter: Autumn already?

Boy wearing a bright green jacket lying in and surrounded by brown leaves.

Keep getting everything you can from your membership

Your events, training and resources

I’m writing this at my desk wondering whether to pop another layer on. Some autumnal weather has really arrived in East North Northamptonshire – even when the sun is shining. Is the Christmas countdown on already?!

Your top 6 interesting things to read this week are:

  1. Read your new briefing yet? Digital twin technology and place-based services
  2. Don’t wait too long to register for your day trip to London to join conference day (People make) Sustainable and Innovative Places on Thursday 10 October.
  3. Your first key date for next year: put President’s Conference in your calendar for Tuesday 10 and Wednesday 11 June 2025.
  4. Institute of Local Government Studies blog post Why do philanthropic foundations engage with city governments?
  5. LGA case study from Richmond and Wandsworth councils: Using the Low Income Family Tracker (LIFT) to improve benefit take-up
  6. Adaptive funding: 8 ways to make funding effective in solving complex problems

Take care. I hope you’re able to have a great weekend.

Best wishes,

Alex.

Illustration of a woman reading an oversized book, entitled, 'Local gov's big book of ideas'.

In Your Resource Hub

NEW Briefing: Digital twin technology and place-based services

This first briefing (of three) covers the application and improvement of place-based services using digital twins

NEW in AI@Socitm

GDPR and Generative AI: A Guide for the Public Sector

Want to add your own content? Let us know on hello@socitm.net or use the contact us form [choose Research as your area of interest].
Help each other connect the dots.

Browse AI@Socitm

You might have missed…

Watch: Future-ready councils: Integrating phone-AI into customer service operations

Hosts from ICS.AI demonstrate the transformative potential of phone-based AI for your customer service.

For ease of viewing, the recordings are divided into easy to navigate chapters, with subtitles and transcript available via the video player toolbar.

Browse the Resource Hub

You will need a user account on socitm.net to access member-only resources. Let us know if need any support.

Socitm Says
Browse all episodes of Socitm Says
Copilot for Microsoft 365 in Public Sector. 1 of October 2024. Principality Stadium. Cardiff,

Copilot for Microsoft 365 in Public Sector

AI Essentials to Drive Business Value and Prevent Risk

Time and date: 09:30 to 17:00 on Tuesday 1 October
Venue: Principality Stadium, Westgate Street, Cardiff, CF10 1NS

Join AvePoint and Microsoft for an opportunity to elevate your experience with Copilot for Microsoft 365.
Get ready to transform the way you work, collaborate, and innovate!
You can look forward to valuable insights and actionable takeaways throughout the day. Discussion Topics during the event include:

  • Customer real-world success stories with Copilot for Microsoft 365
  • Strategies for boosting adoption and improving data quality
  • Addressing the risk – how to ensure the right people have access to the right things
  • Latest updates for Microsoft Copilot
  • Tips, tricks and prompts for Copilot for Microsoft 365

At the end of the day, you will be invited to take part in a tour of the Principality Stadium.

Read more and register

Accessibility and inclusion

Check your Silktide Score. If you’re competitive, see where you’re council ranks in the monthly index. It’s not all about being #1. Neath Port Talbot Council is up 52 places to get into the Top 12. Amazing work!

Digital Accessibility Maturity Assessment
The DAMA is a comprehensive self-assessment of your current level of digital accessibility maturity.

PAUSE
Creating fair and equitable organisations and services is everybody’s responsibility. Take time to reflect and review on your approach and identify where there may be gaps in the way in which you do things. Pause – reflect – act

Log in
Local Government Association logo
PUBLIC logo

Technology Innovation Showcase

The LGA is looking for councils to submit challenge statements setting out the issues and problem areas which could be addressed by AI and smart tech solutions. Submit yours by Thursday 19 September.

After this date a number of submissions will go on to the open call for vendors. Which is where AI and smart technology providers will present solutions in response to the chosen challenge statements.

Keen to take part but want to learn more? Book an initial informal chat with the project team to discuss the problem(s) you are focused on, how you have tried to solve it in the past and how this could be made into a challenge statement

Learn more
7th Digital Leaders Week UK. 14 to 18 October 2024. Be part of the UK's national week accelerating digital transformation.

Dive into all things digital and AI. Whether you’re exploring Generative AI, learning about AI for Good, mastering data-driven decision-making, or championing digital inclusion, there’s something for everyone!

With >150 expert speakers, you’ll get access to thought leaders shaping the digital future. Best of all? Every event is completely free.

Submit a talk
Got an online talk that you’d like to share with an audience of more than 100K? Then the organisers would love to hear from you.

Learn more

Training

Don’t let your training points expire! Get yourself onto training for the new academic year now 🙂

How was your course? Tell us about it and be a training champion 🙂

In-person leadership training

Place-based Leadership
Are you leading a department/service but want to do more and do it better? Give yourself that challenge on:
Thursday 14 and Friday 15 November | Manchester | 4 points

Top Talent
Do you want to lead a department/service? Top Talent will help get you there.
Wednesday 23 and Thursday 24 October | Durham | 4 points

Online core skills courses (with spaces left)

Your annual membership includes training1
Want to spend some training points but not sure how? Don’t have enough or you’ve run out? Let us know.

Your guide to using training points

What don’t you know?

Survey end users’ skills to prioritise your future training needs. Get started with a user skills survey.

Browse all training
Superimposed of a photo of the Houses of Parliament at night are the words: TechHer for Government. Autumn 2024. Creating opportunities for women to learn and develop skills in technology.

Free TechHer training with Microsoft

TechHer is designed to inspire curiosity and excitement about technologies such as cloud, artificial intelligence, data, low code/no code app creation and security.

The sessions are aimed at women in the public sector, who do not necessarily have a technical background but are keen to gain confidence to learn more.

In 1 hour a week over 5 weeks, via Teams, these live and engaging sessions aspire to ignite your interest and build your skills to a fundamental level

Register now
The unseen threat. Unveiling the cyber security dangers you're ignoring. Canon Cyber Security Webinar on Thursday 19 September from 10:00 to 11:0. With Rob Shapland - renowned ethical hacker and security expert who has been featured on ITV, BBC and Sky News.

Ethical Hacking Webinar

Unveiling the cybersecurity dangers you’re ignoring
10:00 to 11:00 on Thursday 19 September

Feeling secure online? Think again. 
Join hosts Canon as renowned cybersecurity expert Rob Shapland unveils the latest tactics hackers use to steal data, disrupt operations, and wreak havoc on businesses of all sizes. Don’t let your guard down! This webinar rips back the curtain on hidden cybersecurity threats.
Learn how to identify these vulnerabilities and fortify your defences before they become a costly problem.

Register now
National conference Sheffield 2024

Events

Member-only meetings

Meet people for catching-up, problem sharing (and solving) and great networking.

Free webinars and meetings hosted by Socitm

Missed one? Recordings of Socitm webinars are available in the Resource hub.
Webinars are open to anyone in the public sector, membership is not necessary, so please do share them with your network.

Browse events

Free webinars and events hosted by partners and others

September

October

November

  • Wednesday 13 to Thursday 14 November LGC Summit [Leeds]

December

Come and say hello

  • Tuesday 17 September: Smarter Working Live 2024
    Join Nadira Hussain in the Judges Hangout session (13:45 to 14:30). Nadira and the other judges will share knowledge and experience on various aspects of strategy, policy, and best practices in areas of smarter working.
  • Wednesday 18 September: Powering the World of Work Government Pioneer Summit
    Hear VP Yogita Popat on the Sector Challenges in Government panel session
  • Tuesday 24 September: DigiGov Expo [London]
    Join Nadira Hussain, President Mark Lumley and Sam Smith
    • Nadira is chairing the Citizen Experience stream. In which, at 15:25, Mark (Director of ICT and Digital at London Borough of Hounslow) is a panellist on Data-Driven Collaboration: Transforming governance through strategic partnerships and enhanced data sharing
    • Sam is a panellist in the GovICT stream at 15:10 for Driving Transformation through an Effective Strategy: The pillars needed to achieve success
  • Thursday 14 November LGC Summit [Leeds]
    Join Nadira Hussain for the panel discussion: Reimagining local government through advanced technologies.

Government Business Magazine

President Carol Williams has written about Connected Places is this latest issue. Some more highlights:

  • Our new government: what to expect. Robyn Quick explores what changes were promised by the Labour Party (page 15) 📚
  • The life of a tree officer [Jessica Stocks of the London Tree Officers Association] (page 35) 🌳🌳
  • A framework for debt resolution (page 65) 💳
  • Procurement Act 2023: The Crown Commercial Service guide to implementing open frameworks (page 83) ✏️
  • Connected places: are they far far away? (page 88) 🦄
  • Bridging the trust gap: overcoming public scepticism in technology in public services
    Heather Cover-Kus and Tess Buckley from techUK look at how to win the public’s trust (page 95) 🔐
  • Cyber Centre of Excellence gives up the complex. Kurtis T. writes about their recent first birthday (page 102) 🎂
  • Ensuring public sector safety in the digital age. Chris Dimitriadis from ISACA looks at how public sector organisations can protect themselves (page 105) 🔐
  • Oh Christmas tree, oh Christmas tree (page 115) 🎄
  • The Crown Commercial Service framework on non-clinical staffing (page 141) 🧑‍⚕️
Browse this issue

Thank you for reading (or scrolling) this far! Just one more thing…

Struggling with change? Liz+Mollie’s most recent newsletter is excellent on transitions and how to move through them 🙂

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

  1. Log in to your user account for an up-to-date number of available training points on the day that you check. Your colleagues could have already used some! ↩︎