Pearson (FTSE: PSON.L), the world’s lifelong learning company, has been awarded the contract to deliver a new online platform, through which UK central government employees will be able to access learning and skills development opportunities.
After a fair and transparent procurement process, the Cabinet Office today announced that it has signed a four-year contract with Pearson to deliver the new cross Government skills capture and learning experience platform.
The platform will bring together for the first time the core learning offer for all government employees, along with resources specific to individual departments and professions.
As well as creating a single ‘front door’ for all pan-government learning, the platform will enable users to create a profile to capture their skills and track completed learning. This will be used to generate personalised training recommendations based on the skills they would like to develop further.
The data generated via the platform will help construct the most accurate picture ever achieved of skills availability across Government – supporting managers to take a more strategic approach to planning and delivering recruitment, development and talent management initiatives.
Of the 68 suppliers that expressed an interest in providing the service, five were shortlisted for panel review, with a final three selected to deliver product demonstrations.
Rebecca Birs, Business Change Lead for the Cabinet Office, said:
“Our ambition is to provide a great user experience for all government employees, empowering them to take charge of their own training and development needs and take a proactive approach to developing their own careers. In addition, the data we will be able to harness will enable the civil service to bring about a significant step change in its skills and workforce planning capabilities.
“Now that the contract has been awarded, we will be working with Pearson to design a roll-out plan that will see the new platform implemented across government over the next two years.”
Oliver Latham, Vice President for Workforce Skills at Pearson said:
“We are excited to work with the Cabinet Office and our ventures company, HowNow, to build and deliver this tailored skills identification and development platform. Employees will be able to build their own ‘Skills Passports’, mapping and acknowledging their existing areas of expertise and allowing them to identify opportunities for further development. It will deliver a single source of truth, with transferrable, consistent, actionable, and accurate skills data across the Civil Service.”
