Social Care Wales

Developing digital learning and development opportunities

15 Incomplete applications

13 SME, 2 large

6 Completed applications

5 SME, 1 large

Published: Monday 24 August 2020
Deadline for asking questions: Monday 31 August 2020 at 11:59pm GMT
Closing date for applications: Monday 7 September 2020 at 11:59pm GMT

Overview

Summary of the work: We are developing our digital offer to the social care and early years workforce. We are looking for experienced digital learning developers to scope user need and usage and develop a minimum of 2 digital learning modules.
Latest start date: Monday 5 October 2020
Expected contract length: Until March 2021
Location: Wales
Organisation the work is for: Social Care Wales
Budget range: £100,000

About the work

Why the work is being done: Our role in workforce development makes it essential that we explore what the national offer is for this increasing digital provision, so that we ease both the human and financial burden away from the individual Local Authorities and / or regions when developing their own solutions and provide a “Once for Wales” offer that in addition to economies of scale will provide consistency and quality assurance in the provision. There is an expectation that this project supports the registered and non registered workforce to use digital learning solution to meet their training and learning needs.
Problem to be solved: We are developing our digital offer to the social care and early years workforce and one of the main themes of this programme of work is to develop digital opportunities to make us more effective in the delivery of national learning and development. As a national organisation we are looking for a more creative solution to our digital learning approach to better support user need.
Who the users are and what they need to do: As a worker in either social care or early years I will need to keep my knowledge and understanding current so I can practice safely and competently. I will also need to keep a record of my training and learning on my CPD record either with Social Care Wales if I am registered or with my employer if I am not.
Early market engagement: At the moment we have anecdotal evidence in relation to our digital platform.
Any work that’s already been done: One of the module topics proposed is currently being delivered via https://www.inductionframework.wales/
Existing team: The supplier will work with a project board, whose members include:
* Transition programme manager - Project manager
* Digital Communication officer
* Improvement and Development Managers
*Engagement and Development Officer
* Assistant Director of Workforce, Assistant Director Corporate Services
*Digital Communities Wales

The programme board and the supplier will be expected to work with:
* other internal team members and stakeholders
* other suppliers
* external organisations based in Wales.
Current phase: Not started

Work setup

Address where the work will take place: Social Care Wales has offices in Cardiff and St Asaph but we are working remotely for the foreseeable future. The work should serve to engage users and stakeholders across the whole of Wales.
Working arrangements: Social Care Wales has an all-Wales remit. We expect this individual or team to work with us remotely for the foreseeable future, making extensive use of video conference technologies. This is because all our staff are currently working from home, due to the pandemic.
Security clearance: N/A

Additional information

Additional terms and conditions

Skills and experience

Buyers will use the essential and nice-to-have skills and experience to help them evaluate suppliers’ technical competence.

Essential skills and experience: experience in user research and conducting it remotely - 2%

Experience of working with users to understand their work, their operating context and constraints & identify & implement adaptations/improvements-2%

Evidence of pulling together the relevant aspects such as user research, organisation design, business analysis, data science and policy intent to deliver digital services – 1.5%

Evidence of designing end-to-end and back to front end services across a range of on-line and off-line channels - 1.5%

Evidence of designing and developing services through iteration, research, prototyping and testing - 2%

Demonstrable understanding the ways of working detailed in the Government Digital Service services manual and designing learning solutions that's passed an accessibility audit and meets WCAG 2.1 – 2%

Evidence of communicating service concepts and ideas using methods that allow others to see all the different parts of a solution - 1.5%

Experience working with an organisation at the beginning of agile culture change and particularly those with no or limited experience of agile and discoveries - 1.5%

Have experience of transferring knowledge to internal staff – 1.5%

Have experience of developing standards and principles to support and underpin digital learning – 1.5%

Demonstrable experience of developing quality products and solution on a large-scale in a public sector setting – 1.5%

Have experience of designing,developing and delivering digital learning solutions for users with low digital literacy – 3%

Have experience of turning research data into clear findings to inform what you build – 1.5%

Evidence and experience of operating bilingual services- 2 %
Nice-to-have skills and experience: Provide evidence of establishing remote working practice – 1%

Provide evidence of producing tangible outputs and not just research reports – 1%

Experience of using umbraco (our current induction framework system is built on Umbraco) – 1%

Provide evidence of how you work in the open - 1%

Experience of informing and supporting the development of a digital learning strategy - 1%

How suppliers will be evaluated

All suppliers will be asked to provide a written proposal.

How many suppliers to evaluate

Proposal criteria

The proposed solution - 9%
How the solution meets user needs - 9%
Demonstrate relevant skills and experience of the team - 5%
How you will inform the proposed approach - 7%

Cultural fit criteria

Able to share your detailed knowledge and skills regarding the user-centred design - 6%
Demonstrate how you will work with clients with different levels of technical expertise throughout the project - 3%
Demonstrate how you will work transparently, collaboratively and share your approach with the project team - 11%

Payment approach

Fixed price

Additional assessment methods

Work history
Reference
Presentation

Evaluation weighting

Technical competence

60%

Cultural fit

20%

Price

20%

Questions asked by suppliers

1. When you say "develop a minimum of 2 digital learning modules" – are you envisaging these will be Live modules rolled out to users as part of this contract?: Yes. We have 2 learning modules where the content has been produced. We would like to work with the supplier on developing these 2 separate subject areas into a digital learning solution that meets learner needs as part of this contract. This would also support us in what we need to consider in how we write and develop content for digital learning.
2. Would this work require Umbraco development or could it be built using a different platform?: Our current platform for one of our learning modules being proposed as one of the 2 modules is the induction framework on principles and values – this uses the Umbraco platform. We would be open to options available to us in what platform would best meet the needs of our learners whilst also recognising that any developments would be part of this contract’s budget.
3. One of the assessment criteria states: "Demonstrable understanding the ways of working detailed in the Government Digital Service services manual and designing learning solutions that's passed an accessibility audit and meets WCAG 2.1 – 2%". Does this mean that the supplier needs to have actually undertaken and passed an accessibility audit for at least one of their digital products in the past? OR, does it mean that the supplier needs to be able to demonstrate understanding of the process (not having actually completed the activity)?: Any future learning solutions that we offer to the sector will need to be in line with WCAG 2.1 – we will need assurance from the supplier that our solution will meet these and how they will go about meeting that requirement. As part of this assurance you will need to evidence your experience of designing learning solutions that have passed an accessibility audit and meets WCAG 2.1
4. The section that details required supplier experience mentions the public sector and large scale services. Is it essential that the supplier has delivered large scale digital solutions for the public sector or would it be satisfactory for the supplier to have delivered large scale solutions for multinational corporations as well as small scale solutions for public bodies, e.g. local councils?: In terms of defining this requirement it would be satisfactory for the supplier to have delivered large scale solutions for multinational corporations as well as small scale solutions for public bodies, e.g. local councils
5. Can you clarify what is meant by "Evidence of designing end-to-end and back to front end services across a range of on-line and off-line channels – 1.5%"? Regarding the off-line aspect, are you asking whether the supplier has experience of designing digital solutions that are available to users when they do not have internet access?: Yes. We would be looking for evidence of the supplier having experience of designing services that can work for people who do not have access to the internet and therefore would need other ways of accessing the service/ solution ‘off-line’
6. You mention that you would consider remote delivery. Do you have any geographical restrictions? Would nearshore be considered – for example, Romania, Moldova and Bulgaria, with provisions for collaboration and onsite presence as and when required?: When we say remote delivery, we mean it in the context of the UK, and communicating and collaborating virtually to minimise risk of infection in the current pandemic.
7. What types of content will be used for the course material? Is it only video, images, PDF and audio or HTML content with some interactive features? Or a combination of both?: For the 2 modules we currently only have the word and powerpoint materials however we would be looking at interactive features as part of this project (which would include videos, audio and images). Therefore the final modules would be a combination of both which would be accessible to all users bilingually.
8. What will the volume of course content be? Will it just be the two modules mentioned?: As it stands we are looking to pilot two modules of learning content to help us test out with the sector what works for the learners – we would then use this as a basis for our approach in developing future digital learning modules.
9. Are there any member specific courses or will all members have access to all content?: One of the training modules identified, ideally, will link to an existing or potential future membership (registration of an individual). The other training module would be accessible to all.
10. Will there be a required reading flow or can users read the course material in any order?: There is a mix. One of the learning modules has a reading flow. The other can be completed dependent on learner.
11. What type of reporting will be required for the CMS admin?: Standard reporting such as – number of unique users using the learning, progress, number of users completed, how users rate the learning experience.
12. Will there be assessments after each module and, if yes, what type of questions will these assessments need to have?: For one of the training modules identified for this project there is an assessment at the end of the module to demonstrate completion, understanding and personal reflections.
13. Will users need to have a personal history showing them the content that they have engaged with?: It would be beneficial to the user that they can see their progress in working through the module along with showing what previous content they have engaged with and potentially what other learning content would be beneficial to the individual based on their personal history.
14. Are you able to share any wireframes or visuals of the existing module to give us a better understanding of the expectations?: The link to one of the learning modules was included within the specification of requirements:
https://www.inductionframework.wales/
15. Will you be held to any standards or requirements for the learning modules, such as SCORM 2.1?: We would be looking to the advice from the supplier on what standards would be applicable that meet the needs of the learners along with how this works with our business needs.
16. Your tender mentions a bilingual requirement. What other languages will be required apart from English (UK)?: Welsh.
17. Can you give us an idea of the number of end users and admin users that will be using the platform?: End users – potentially as many as 100,000 people who work in social care and early years would have access to the learning.
In terms of admin users, this is yet to be determined.
18. Is the provision of hosting to be included in this budget or offered separately?: Hosting of any platforms to support the 2 learning pilot modules should be included within the response.

We are using this project as an opportunity to look at what our digital infrastructure to support digital learning for the sector needs to look like in future. We would like the supplier to work with us on these recommendations.
19. What security requirements do you have for this project?: We would need any solution to be compliant with requirements under DPA 2018 and GDPR. We are also accredited with ISO27001:2013.

We would want to be designing our learning modules in line with our compliance requirements from the start and throughout this project.
20. Will we have to integrate this platform with any other platform(s)? Do the users currently use CPD?: Where a user is registered with us we would like to consider how we could link up their learning with their CPD record (which is currently on another platform). Not all users (learners) will be registered with us.
21. Please can you clarify what is defined by 'working in the open'? Is this around transparency with clients or case studies? Or references? Many thanks: Working in the open relates to being transparent and open in terms of project progress, compliance, decisions and options available to us in meeting learner and our business needs.

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