The National Audit Office (NAO) has published a report on the Digital Skills Gap in Government. The report presents the main findings of a survey querying digital and technology (DaT) leaders across government agencies about their views on the current state of digital skills in government.

The NAO believes that the recent wave of austerity – which has cut civil service headcount by nearly one-fifth in five years – has intensified the need for digitally-enabled transformation of government services. According to the independent auditing body, only through the latter will the government be able to continue cutting costs without compromising the quality of public services.

The survey has found that there is a “widespread acknowledgement” of the existence of a digital skills gap in Whitehall.

The survey also found that the majority of DaT leaders think that current initiatives to improve skills are effective. However, they believe that there is still room for improvement, particularly by focusing on embedding digital within the overall business strategy and building digital capability accordingly.

On the issue of DaT leadership within government, the survey found there is still a small number of DaT leaders in government agencies, with around 70% of organizations employing 10 or fewer DaT leaders. Those in leadership positions had few years of experience in the post.

Finally, respondents identified a variety of constraints to public sector skills development. At the top of the list are concerns about external market conditions (78%), limited supply (67%) and procurement constraints (58%). All of which are thought to impact negatively on efforts to recruit, retain and develop staff or acquire temporary resources with the needed digital skills.

Financial position and budgets, cultural issues, career paths and competing priorities have largest negative impacts on developing existing staff; market conditions, pay and recruiting processes have largest negative impacts on recruitment and retention; procurement processes have largest negative impact on obtaining external resources.

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