The Compass enables a range of professionals – not just those in digital, marketing or leadership roles – to collaborate to assess their organisation’s 'digital maturity'. This online tool enables this maturity to be self-evaluated and allows users to identify opportunities to develop and plan. The accompanying Digital Culture Charter is a set of principles that organisations can sign up to, to ensure that their use of digital is in line with their cultural vision, organisational mission and ethical standards.
In brief, the compass incorporates:
- Digital Maturity Index – to enable organisations to understand and benchmark their own digital capability and set plans in place to make improvements.
- Digital Culture Code – to demonstrate a commitment to developing their own digital maturity and the maturity of the wider cultural sector.
The Compass forms part of Arts Council England and The National Lottery Heritage Fund’s broader work in helping the cultural and heritage sectors to make the most of digital technology. The Compass responds to a recommendation from the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport’s 2018 Culture is Digital report. It sits alongside other Culture is Digital policy commitments, co-delivered by The Audience Agency Group. It has been developed by a partnership led by The Space, with Golant Innovation/The Audience Agency, Creative Co-op, Culture24 and the University of Leicester.
The underlying maturity model can be used in ‘offline’ discussions, strategy development and planning between colleagues so that they can come to a common understanding of what ‘digital’ has meant and will mean for their organisation. This is in line with how we have successfully supported organisational change through digital for a number of Arts Council England National Portfolio Organisations. The underlying principles of the Compass have also been informed by our work delivering digital strategies for projects funded by The National Lottery Heritage Fund and more general digital maturity reviews.
We are also today launching our Digital for… workshops on these and other topics.