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When is the right time for digital transformation in higher ed? Where do you even begin? Most articles suggest the time is...now? But that’s not always practical, and it can’t be a rush-job. Digital transformation is a process, not a one-time project.
In this article, we look at various different catalysts and starting places for digital transformation, so you can figure out the best way for your institution to approach it.
First, we’ll take a brief look at the state of digital transformation in higher education. We have done our own report on the state of digital environments in HE in partnership with eQAfy. The results show an analysis of the digital environments of 156 UK and 160 US universities.
What the study found was that most universities are still grappling with legacy technologies, and consolidating data across multiple silos, and bloated, outdated content. Universities are unique in that they have entire web content estates to deal with—the largest UK university site has 1,900,000 pages; the largest US has 8,500,000. Wow.
Despite this, in a study by Deloitte on the technological disruptions facing public sector organisations, higher education gained above-average scores in the following areas (among others):
That said, leadership and workforce skills proved less positive categories for HE. It scored below-average ratings for:
Digital transformation is really all about managing people, processes and technology, as well as digital content across an institution. So what are the catalysts? Where do higher ed organisations start? Here are just a few examples:
Students today spend a lot of time on the internet, and visiting college and university websites. And the folks at EDUCAUSE have said that:
"The focus on the customer is the most crucial element in digital transformation. Tom Loosemore, founder of the UK's Government Digital Service agency, summed up this concept in a tweet (May 20, 2016) "Digital: Applying the culture, practices, processes & technologies of the Internet-era to respond to people's raised expectations." The extraordinary value of meeting these increased customer expectations has dramatically changed business models, with examples from Amazon to Airbnb to Uber.”
And, in higher education, of course. Most students work remotely in some form already at universities, and now with the changing culture, remote, not 9-5. Interaction with students needs to be user focused. Think:
Websites are usually redesigned somewhere between every two and 10 years. But if you’ve left it for five years, you probably need an update. You might not need a total overhaul, but you do need to make sure that things like information architecture, page loading speed, mobile access, and overall user experience are up to scratch. Students (particularly millennial and Gen Z) will just go elsewhere if your website doesn’t help answer their questions — and fast. You should also be constantly tweaking your websites to reflect user and business needs. They are never ‘done.’
For the best outcomes, focus on going content-first with your website redesign, which means using ‘proto-content’ in the design phase instead of lorem ipsum. Redesigning your website with content front-of-mind will also ensure you can focus on things like increasing traffic and conversions through the content on your site. Check out our webinar on planning for content during website redesigns. Or if you need to migrate content, check out our strategies for success.
In terms of accessibility, there are strict standards that websites must adhere to (with new deadlines for UK institutions). In the US, federal, state, and local government websites must comply with Section 508 regulations, and make their electronic and information technology accessible to people with disabilities. In the UK, all public sector websites and apps must be up to scratch with the WCAG 2.1 (level AA) standard (more on this later) and must include people with disabilities in user research and have an accessibility statement on their website. Here are the deadlines:
This means lots of universities are now scrambling to get their website and apps up to speed for accessibility purposes. This is a great opportunity for institutions to update and declutter websites, improve content quality overall, as well as making them more accessible
Many universities work in silos, which is an issue for communication and collaboration, but digital transformation can help solve this problem with the right tools in place. Content strategy goes hand in hand with digital transformation, and delivering useful, usable and up to date content you need the right tools, processes, systems and culture.
We talk a lot about Content Operation (ContentOps) here at GatherContent which is a new way of looking at content creation and management. It’s about looking at the tools, processes and people involved in content creation holistically. And efficient ContentOps is how you connect silos in your institution. You need to think about things like clearly defined roles, production workflows, and style guides to ensure content operations run smoothly.
We recently interviewed Padma Gillen who is a digital content consultant, and was previously Head of Content Design at the Government Digital Service (GDS). He had overall responsibility for the quality of content on GOV.UK.
Padma is currently working with the University of Southampton on a digital transformation project, and he’s also just launched his new book, Lead With Content which is all about putting content at the heart of digital transformation. In the interview, when talking about content governance he says:
“Every page should have an owner, and every page should have an established review cycle. If you haven’t enforced a review of your site pages in a while, chances are you have duplicative and inaccurate information to wrestle with.”
It’s so important to think about your content strategy alongside digital transformation to ensure you can improve your current content and start building good habits that will save you time, effort and money in the long run.
Improving organisational processes is a huge part of digital transformation. This goes for all processes, but in this article we’ll focus on content processes. As we touched on in an earlier point, most higher ed institutions have some form of content process bug-bears.
You can solve these with the right technology for your institution. It’s best to use a single editing environment so content is centralised (rather than having multiple tools which can get confusing for everyone) and tools that have the right features for the job: content creation and management. Some of the key things that tech can help with when it comes to content is:
GatherContent does all of this and more. The University of Leicester used GatherContent for a website redesign project, and liked it so much that they then went on to use it to streamline processes, and centralise content production, editing and approval for a successful digital transformation.
A change in culture is part and parcel of digital transformation, but organisations must seek to really foster a culture of understanding, trust and safety around digital to get this right. Remember, digital transformation isn’t about just ‘change.’ Instead of reacting to immediate needs, “transformation is about the proactive, enterprise-wide steps that institutions can take to meet future needs,” as James Wiley says at EdTechMagazine.
Institutions that want to implement real transformation need to get stakeholders involved (check out our webinar with Head of Digital at University of Southampton on making your digital transformation business case a reality).You need to communicate with and train stakeholders early on in the process to ensure everyone is on board with digital transformation, and it can run as smoothly as possible.
It’s been hard not to talk about COVID-19 in this article, and we’re living in uncertain times. Content is now more important than ever; and digital transformation can help. Institutions need to get content out, online, and fast and the pressure’s on. But if you do digital transformation alongside content strategy, you can achieve:
So thinking about your audience and what will make them happy pays off!
With all of that said, it can be hard to get people on board with your projects in higher education. When it comes to getting stakeholders together in content and digital transformation projects, we recommend this webinar on making your business case for digital transformation a reality. To find out how GatherContent can help with productivity, compliance and quality in your content, visit our higher education industry page.
When is the right time for digital transformation in higher ed? Where do you even begin? Most articles suggest the time is...now? But that’s not always practical, and it can’t be a rush-job. Digital transformation is a process, not a one-time project.
In this article, we look at various different catalysts and starting places for digital transformation, so you can figure out the best way for your institution to approach it.
First, we’ll take a brief look at the state of digital transformation in higher education. We have done our own report on the state of digital environments in HE in partnership with eQAfy. The results show an analysis of the digital environments of 156 UK and 160 US universities.
What the study found was that most universities are still grappling with legacy technologies, and consolidating data across multiple silos, and bloated, outdated content. Universities are unique in that they have entire web content estates to deal with—the largest UK university site has 1,900,000 pages; the largest US has 8,500,000. Wow.
Despite this, in a study by Deloitte on the technological disruptions facing public sector organisations, higher education gained above-average scores in the following areas (among others):
That said, leadership and workforce skills proved less positive categories for HE. It scored below-average ratings for:
Digital transformation is really all about managing people, processes and technology, as well as digital content across an institution. So what are the catalysts? Where do higher ed organisations start? Here are just a few examples:
Students today spend a lot of time on the internet, and visiting college and university websites. And the folks at EDUCAUSE have said that:
"The focus on the customer is the most crucial element in digital transformation. Tom Loosemore, founder of the UK's Government Digital Service agency, summed up this concept in a tweet (May 20, 2016) "Digital: Applying the culture, practices, processes & technologies of the Internet-era to respond to people's raised expectations." The extraordinary value of meeting these increased customer expectations has dramatically changed business models, with examples from Amazon to Airbnb to Uber.”
And, in higher education, of course. Most students work remotely in some form already at universities, and now with the changing culture, remote, not 9-5. Interaction with students needs to be user focused. Think:
Websites are usually redesigned somewhere between every two and 10 years. But if you’ve left it for five years, you probably need an update. You might not need a total overhaul, but you do need to make sure that things like information architecture, page loading speed, mobile access, and overall user experience are up to scratch. Students (particularly millennial and Gen Z) will just go elsewhere if your website doesn’t help answer their questions — and fast. You should also be constantly tweaking your websites to reflect user and business needs. They are never ‘done.’
For the best outcomes, focus on going content-first with your website redesign, which means using ‘proto-content’ in the design phase instead of lorem ipsum. Redesigning your website with content front-of-mind will also ensure you can focus on things like increasing traffic and conversions through the content on your site. Check out our webinar on planning for content during website redesigns. Or if you need to migrate content, check out our strategies for success.
In terms of accessibility, there are strict standards that websites must adhere to (with new deadlines for UK institutions). In the US, federal, state, and local government websites must comply with Section 508 regulations, and make their electronic and information technology accessible to people with disabilities. In the UK, all public sector websites and apps must be up to scratch with the WCAG 2.1 (level AA) standard (more on this later) and must include people with disabilities in user research and have an accessibility statement on their website. Here are the deadlines:
This means lots of universities are now scrambling to get their website and apps up to speed for accessibility purposes. This is a great opportunity for institutions to update and declutter websites, improve content quality overall, as well as making them more accessible
Many universities work in silos, which is an issue for communication and collaboration, but digital transformation can help solve this problem with the right tools in place. Content strategy goes hand in hand with digital transformation, and delivering useful, usable and up to date content you need the right tools, processes, systems and culture.
We talk a lot about Content Operation (ContentOps) here at GatherContent which is a new way of looking at content creation and management. It’s about looking at the tools, processes and people involved in content creation holistically. And efficient ContentOps is how you connect silos in your institution. You need to think about things like clearly defined roles, production workflows, and style guides to ensure content operations run smoothly.
We recently interviewed Padma Gillen who is a digital content consultant, and was previously Head of Content Design at the Government Digital Service (GDS). He had overall responsibility for the quality of content on GOV.UK.
Padma is currently working with the University of Southampton on a digital transformation project, and he’s also just launched his new book, Lead With Content which is all about putting content at the heart of digital transformation. In the interview, when talking about content governance he says:
“Every page should have an owner, and every page should have an established review cycle. If you haven’t enforced a review of your site pages in a while, chances are you have duplicative and inaccurate information to wrestle with.”
It’s so important to think about your content strategy alongside digital transformation to ensure you can improve your current content and start building good habits that will save you time, effort and money in the long run.
Improving organisational processes is a huge part of digital transformation. This goes for all processes, but in this article we’ll focus on content processes. As we touched on in an earlier point, most higher ed institutions have some form of content process bug-bears.
You can solve these with the right technology for your institution. It’s best to use a single editing environment so content is centralised (rather than having multiple tools which can get confusing for everyone) and tools that have the right features for the job: content creation and management. Some of the key things that tech can help with when it comes to content is:
GatherContent does all of this and more. The University of Leicester used GatherContent for a website redesign project, and liked it so much that they then went on to use it to streamline processes, and centralise content production, editing and approval for a successful digital transformation.
A change in culture is part and parcel of digital transformation, but organisations must seek to really foster a culture of understanding, trust and safety around digital to get this right. Remember, digital transformation isn’t about just ‘change.’ Instead of reacting to immediate needs, “transformation is about the proactive, enterprise-wide steps that institutions can take to meet future needs,” as James Wiley says at EdTechMagazine.
Institutions that want to implement real transformation need to get stakeholders involved (check out our webinar with Head of Digital at University of Southampton on making your digital transformation business case a reality).You need to communicate with and train stakeholders early on in the process to ensure everyone is on board with digital transformation, and it can run as smoothly as possible.
It’s been hard not to talk about COVID-19 in this article, and we’re living in uncertain times. Content is now more important than ever; and digital transformation can help. Institutions need to get content out, online, and fast and the pressure’s on. But if you do digital transformation alongside content strategy, you can achieve:
So thinking about your audience and what will make them happy pays off!
With all of that said, it can be hard to get people on board with your projects in higher education. When it comes to getting stakeholders together in content and digital transformation projects, we recommend this webinar on making your business case for digital transformation a reality. To find out how GatherContent can help with productivity, compliance and quality in your content, visit our higher education industry page.
Paige is an English Literature and Media graduate from Newcastle University, and over the last three years has built up a career in SEO-driven copywriting for tech companies. She has written for Microsoft, Symantec and LinkedIn, as well as other SaaS companies and IT consulting firms. With an audience-focused approach to content, Paige handles the lifecycle from creation through to measurement, supporting businesses with their content operations.