Digital Skills for Heritage

Digital Skills for Heritage

A woman holidaing a mobile phone, showing a man standing next to her something on th ephone screen.
Minder Kaur Athwal, a trustee at the Digital Skills for Heritage-supported Heritage Trust Network. Credit: Sarah Hayes.
Our 4-year, £4.2million initiative designed to raise digital skills and confidence across the UK heritage sector.

Between 2020 and 2024 we funded 55 projects that supported over 53,000 individuals working and volunteering in over 6,400 organisations.

Our aim was to build digital confidence among small and volunteer-led organisations, to provide digital training and learning opportunities to increase the reach and impact of small and medium-sized organisations, and support digital leadership across the sector.

Not only did our initiative increase digital skills and confidence, but we also saw an increase in access to heritage and reach to new audiences, and we helped develop a network of digital support organisations and experts.

Read the evaluation of our Digital Skills for Heritage initiative.

Digital remains a key priority for the Heritage Fund. It runs through our investment principles and we'll continue to invest in digital through National Lottery Heritage Grants.

What we funded

Teams from Arts Marketing Association, University of Leeds and The Heritage Alliance researched and consulted with the sector to find organisations' 100 most pressing digital questions. The answers are published on their Digital Heritage Hub.

Charity Digital Trust’s Heritage Digital Academy helped heritage organisations apply digital to their strategic and operational planning. Their website includes a suite of useful resources

Culture24 hosted two cohorts for Leading the Sector, a programme to help trustees and executives expand their organisations’ digital capabilities. Watch recordings of the leadership webinars on Culture 24's YouTube channel and explore their leadership 'pathway' tool.

The Digital Heritage Lab and Heritage Digital programmes offered training, webinars and resources on topics including marketing, content creation and data protection. Check their websites for recordings and resources.

17 projects created digital volunteering roles across the sector. One of the outputs was Vocal Eyes’ Heritage Access 2022, a report on the accessibility of UK museum and heritage websites and an accompanying benchmark tool for heritage organisations. 

Eight networks supported communities of practice to pool resources and expertise around particular heritage areas. 

Insights

Explore the results from our two Digital Attitudes and Skills for Heritage (DASH) surveys, which helped us understand and respond to the needs of the sector:

Screenshots of Teams webinar of the host and the three speakers

Stories

Top tips for hybrid working in the heritage sector

The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has driven many heritage organisations to take the leap into hybrid working. This is where staff and volunteers split their time between working in an office and other locations such as their home. In March, senior heritage professionals took part in the first