This document outlines plans for training staff at St Andrews University in digital communications. It discusses: 1) The "Digital visa" training program developed at St Andrews, which includes core and optional sessions to provide digital skills. Completing the visa qualifies staff to work on digital projects. 2) Details of specific Digital visa training sessions, such as writing for the web, social media strategy, and using Google Data Studio. 3) The benefits of the Digital visa training, including improved web content quality and consistency, and stronger relationships across the university. 4) Best practices for developing an effective training program, including determining objectives, creating lesson plans, engaging activities, evaluation, and ongoing management.

1. Training staff in
digital communications
Presenter: Jennifer Hamrick
Email: jh280@st-andrews.ac.uk

2. Aim and objectives
Aim
Create your own lesson plan to train higher education staff in
digital communications topics.
Objectives
• determine the aims and objectives
for a training course
• develop a lesson plan
• create interactive exercises
• evaluate the success of your
training sessions
• manage a programme of training
session.

3. What we’re doing at St Andrews
● We had too many webpages and not enough web team staff.

4. What we’re doing at St Andrews
● We had too many webpages and not enough web team staff.
● We wanted to provide courses for internal staff so we could
rely on them to help us develop high-quality web content.

5. What we’re doing at St Andrews
● We had too many webpages and not enough web team staff.
● We wanted to provide courses for internal staff so we could
rely on them to help us develop high-quality web content.
● We developed a mini-series of core and optional training
sessions called the “Digital visa”.

6. Digital visa
Those who complete the visa have all the
tools and knowledge to confidently work
on digital communications projects.
They are the first point of contact
between our team and their department.

7. Digital visa Digital communications at
St Andrews
Introduces staff to our team and the
support we provide.
Those who complete the visa have all the
tools and knowledge to confidently work
on digital communications projects.
They are the first point of contact
between our team and their department.

8. Digital visa Writing for the web
Allows staff to identify and implement
user needs in web writing.Those who complete the visa have all the
tools and knowledge to confidently work
on digital communications projects.
They are the first point of contact
between our team and their department.

9. Digital visa Social media
Three part course:
● Introduction to social media
● Develop a social media strategy
● Create content for social media
Those who complete the visa have all the
tools and knowledge to confidently work
on digital communications projects.
They are the first point of contact
between our team and their department.

10. Digital visa Visualising data with Google Data
Studio
Allows staff to measure the
performance of their website and
understand users’ behaviour by
creating a dashboard in Google Data
Studio.
Those who complete the visa have all the
tools and knowledge to confidently work
on digital communications projects.
They are the first point of contact
between our team and their department.

11. Digital visa Introduction to the digital pattern
library
Allows staff to identify and become
familiar with the visual elements that
make up the University’s website.
Those who complete the visa have all the
tools and knowledge to confidently work
on digital communications projects.
They are the first point of contact
between our team and their department.

12. Digital visa Optional session:
Usability testing - allows staff to
conduct usability testing to evaluate
the performance of their own
webpages.
Those who complete the visa have all the
tools and knowledge to confidently work
on digital communications projects.
They are the first point of contact
between our team and their department.

13. Success of training at St Andrews
● Content meets best practice.
● Standards are kept consistent across University webpages.
● We have built relationships across the University.

14. Success of training at St Andrews
● Content meets best practice.
● Standards are kept consistent across University webpages.
● We have built relationships across the University.
“If you do anything on the web, worthwhile to come along.”
- Introduction to the DPL

15. Success of training at St Andrews
● Content meets best practice.
● Standards are kept consistent across University webpages.
● We have built relationships across the University.
“It is a great course for anyone interested in editing web
pages or building a website.”
- Writing for the web

16. Success of training at St Andrews
● Content meets best practice.
● Standards are kept consistent across University webpages.
● We have built relationships across the University.
“This should be a necessity for all Schools/Units who have
social media accounts.”
- Social media

17. Success of training at St Andrews
● Content meets best practice.
● Standards are kept consistent across University webpages.
● We have built relationships across the University.
“I have already recommended the digital visa to colleagues,
and will continue to do so, and you’ll definitely see me at
more courses in the future.”
- Digital visa

18. Brainstorm activity
What are some of the topics, ideas or processes you want
internal staff at your university to know?
● Put your ideas down on your exercise
sheet (5 min).
● Discuss your ideas with someone sitting
next to you.

19. Determine your aims and objectives
Aim
● What do you want your trainees to be able to do?
● Go further than just “understand” or “know how to”.

20. Determine your aims and objectives
Aim
● What do you want your trainees to be able to do?
● Go further than just “understand” or “know how to”.
Example aim:
Allow you to generate content to meet your social media strategy.
- Social media: content creation

21. Activity: create an aim
Turn one of your ideas from your brainstorm into an aim to use
for training (3 min).
Share your idea with someone sitting next to
you.

22. Determine your aims and objectives
Objectives
● Specifies the learning that should be achieved by the end of
the session.
● Should be SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic,
time-bound)
● Should start with an action verb (avoid vague verbs like
“understand”, “know how to”, or “appreciate”).
● Your objectives will help you structure your training session.

23. Determine your aims and objectives
Example objectives:
By the end of the session, you will be able to:
● define user-centred design
● generate user stories
● analyse how people use the web
● identify technology challenges for web writing
● identify what to avoid when writing for the web
● apply user needs when editing and writing content.
- Writing for the web

24. Mind map activity
In groups of 5, pick one of your team member’s aims and work
together to create a mind map of possible objectives (10 min).

25. From: jean-louise Zimmerman (Flickr: https://flic.kr/p/5CLvxr). No changes made.

26. Develop a lesson plan
The lesson plan…
● sets out the order of your training session
● includes helpful notes about timings, exercises and equipment.

29. Develop a lesson plan
What are the benefits of having a lesson plan?

30. Develop a lesson plan
What are the benefits of having a lesson plan?
● keeps you on track
● makes sure nothing is left out
● makes sure you meet all your objectives
● makes sure you stick to your timings
● helps you prepare before the lesson
● keeps courses consistent
● allows other team members to take over training sessions
● useful as a reference in case you forget
● justify training to senior management.

31. Develop a lesson plan
Introduction phase

32. Develop a lesson plan
Introduction phase
● Title, aim and objectives
● Range: methods of learning, length of session, taking notes,
etc.
● Icebreaker activity
● Stimulate interest in subject.

34. Develop a lesson plan
Icebreaker activities
The best icebreaker activities…
● energise the group
● help the group to know one another
● make the group feel comfortable
● interest the group in the subject of the session.

35. Develop a lesson plan
Icebreaker activities
● Introduce your partner to the group

36. Develop a lesson plan
Icebreaker activities
● Introduce your partner to the group
● Two truths and a lie

37. Develop a lesson plan
Icebreaker activities
● Introduce your partner to the group
● Two truths and a lie
● Stand in a line

38. Develop a lesson plan
Icebreaker activities
● Introduce your partner to the group
● Two truths and a lie
● Stand in a line
● Social bingo!

39. Develop a lesson plan
Icebreaker activities
● Introduce your partner to the group
● Two truths and a lie
● Stand in a line
● Social bingo!
● Quick introduction.

40. Develop a lesson plan
Icebreaker activities
In your groups, pick one of the icebreaker activities (or think of a new
one) and adapt it to your training topic.

41. Develop a lesson plan
Development phase
The development phase is structured around your objectives.
Each objective (or learning outcome) should typically include a
brief presentation followed by an activity.
The average attention span is only 22 minutes long, so be sure
that no single presentation or activity goes longer than this.

42. Develop a lesson plan
Development phase
For each objective, include:
● presentation notes
● timings
● equipments and resources
● activity notes.

44. Develop a lesson plan
Keep your audience engaged throughout your presentations:
● Ask if they know the definition of a newly introduced term.
● Get them to brainstorm ideas (for example, the benefits of
having a lesson plan!)
● Ask if they have any stories to share from their own
experience.
● For longer sessions, include breaks.

45. Develop a lesson plan
Development activities
● Post-it brainstorm or mind map

46. Develop a lesson plan
Development activities
● Post-it brainstorm or mind map
● Matching game

47. Develop a lesson plan
Development activities
● Post-it brainstorm or mind map
● Matching game
● Put things in the right order

48. Develop a lesson plan
Development activities
● Post-it brainstorm or mind map
● Matching game
● Put things in the right order
● Red light / green light

49. Develop a lesson plan
Development activities
● Post-it brainstorm or mind map
● Matching game
● Put things in the right order
● Red light / green light
● Scenario cards.

50. Develop a lesson plan
Development activities
In your groups, pick one of the development activities (or think of
a new one) and adapt it to your training topic.

51. Develop a lesson plan
Summary phase
● Provide a conclusion.
● Re-state the learning objectives (and establish if they have
been met).
● Include a summary activity to reinforce main learning points.
Learners tend to remember the first and last items in a session
best, so a strong summary is necessary!

53. Develop a lesson plan
Summary activities
● Question and answer

54. Develop a lesson plan
Summary activities
● Question and answer
● Multiple choice quiz

55. Develop a lesson plan
Summary activities
● Question and answer
● Multiple choice quiz
● Present back what they learned

56. Develop a lesson plan
Summary activities
● Question and answer
● Multiple choice quiz
● Present back what they learned
● Group-created quiz

57. Develop a lesson plan
Summary activities
● Question and answer
● Multiple choice quiz
● Present back what they learned
● Group-created quiz
● Write down the actions they will take based on the
training.

58. Develop a lesson plan
Summary activities
In your groups, pick one of the summary activities (or
think of a new one) and adapt it to your training topic.

59. Evaluate your success
You need to constantly evaluate your training sessions.
One way to do this is through evaluation forms.

60. Evaluate your success
Evaluation forms
● Hand these out in the last 15 minutes of your session.
● On the front, include a simple box ticking grid.
● On the back, include these four questions:
○ What aspects of the session did you find most useful?
○ What aspects of the session did you find least useful?
○ Is there anything we could do to improve the session?
○ What would you say to someone interested in taking this course?
● Evaluation forms should be anonymous.

61. Evaluate your success
Examples of helpful feedback:
“Provide handouts to write down notes.”

62. Evaluate your success
Examples of helpful feedback:
“Some of the wording in the exercises was a bit ambiguous.”

63. Evaluate your success
Examples of helpful feedback:
“More time for exercises.”

64. Evaluate your success
Examples of helpful feedback:
“Least useful: Responsive web design - not sure how relevant if
we can’t really change this at present.”

65. Evaluate your success
Examples of helpful feedback:
“More explanation of BASIC terminology e.g., what is @ and what
is #.”
“Send out basics in an instruction form so everyone knows the
absolute basics before arrival. Therefore, can look into social
media more in depth straight away.”

66. Evaluate your success
Evaluate yourself too! Take notes about what went well and what
didn’t. How could you improve?

67. Evaluate your success
Scenario card activity
In new groups, decide what you would do with the feedback on
your card.

68. Manage a training programme
What are some of the benefits of a training programme
rather than running sessions individually?

69. Manage a training programme
What are some of the benefits of a training programme
rather than running sessions individually?
● Helps keep you organised (courses run on a
schedule).
● Gives participants a sense of purpose and
accomplishment.
● Encourages participants to take the full suite on offer.
● Helps you keep track of who has or who has not
completed certain training.

70. Manage a training programme
Define the aim and objectives of your training programme.

71. Manage a training programme
Example from the ‘digital visa’:
Aim
Enable staff to feel competent and confident working on
digital communications projects and provide new skills in
a range of digital areas.

72. Manage a training programme
Objectives
● Raise awareness about digital communications processes and
support at the University.
● Enable participants to feel competent and confident working
on digital communications projects.
● Develop new skills in a range of digital areas, including: digital
pattern libraries, writing for the web, social media and web
analytics.
● Provide a structured development programme for participants
using a wide variety of activities, particularly using computer
technology.

73. Manage a training programme
Decide what your compulsory training sessions will
be.
Anything that doesn’t need to be taken to meet the
aims and objectives of your programme should be an
optional course.

74. Manage a training programme
Define the key outcomes or benefits for your
participants.
Examples:
● Become digital advocates in their department.
● Act as a key point of contact with the digital
communications team and their department.
● Add new skills to their CV.

75. Manage a training programme
How will you schedule your sessions?
● You’ll need to offer each course multiple times
throughout the year.
● Schedule sessions to take place on different days of
the week and at different times of the day.

76. Manage a training programme
Who can enrol on your training programme?

77. Manage a training programme
Create a launch campaign
Advertise the launch of your training programme to build interest.
Offline:
● brochure
● posters
● speak to people!

78. Manage a training programme
Create a launch campaign
Advertise the launch of your training programme to build interest.
Online:
● create a ‘Training’ webpage
● blog
● staff newsletter
● email.

79. Manage a training programme
Keep track of your participants and which courses they complete.
A physical booklet of this is a great idea.
Let them know when they’ve completed the programme.

80. Individual exercise
Go back to your first brainstorm activity. Can you turn any of
these into compulsory training sessions? Which ones would
make good optional modules?
Write these down in your handouts.

81. Train the trainer
What we didn’t cover today:
● delivering and presenting
● using visual aids
● different learning styles (activist, reflector, theorist, pragmatist;
visual, auditory, kinaesthetic)
● dealing with difficult situations or people
● equality and access
● creating learning materials such as handouts.

82. Summary activity
In your handouts, write down the three things you’re going to do
next based on today’s masterclass.

83. Any questions?
Please fill out the evaluation form and leave it on the table at the back.