Addressing the digital skills gap, supporting diversity, and preparing for the changing world of work; our core objective is to benefit working adults who want to upskill themselves in data to address the demands of increasingly digital workplaces.

The success of this scheme has been recognised by the Scottish Government and other City Deal Partnerships with new funding secured to pilot the scheme in other regions.

Who is the programme for?

• Individuals looking for opportunities to upskill or reskill
• Employers looking to improve data literacy across the workforce
• Training and education providers who want to reach learners from diverse backgrounds

The Data Skills for Work programme is led by The Data Lab and is part of the Data Skills Gateway, part of the Data Driven Innovation (DDI) initiative at the University of Edinburgh.

Data Skills for Work has helped us tremendously by increasing the number of women taking part in our courses, and allowing us to deliver courses in a way that is affordable and flexible to learners from underrepresented group.

Sam Blyth, Head of School, School of Computing and Technology, Edinburgh College

Learn more about Data Skills for Work

The Data Skills for Work framework aims to support opportunities for reskilling and upskilling, addressing the needs – and gaps – that have been identified through our research. The skills and competencies detailed under each theme are not intended to be an exhaustive mapping of each discipline, but rather highlight the key requirements and opportunities that can enable workforce development.

Our impact

Since launching our Data Skills Credits small grants scheme in 2020, Data Skills for Work at The Data Lab has supported almost 700 learners to access digital and data short courses, delivered by a network of training and education partners. We have worked with 20+ businesses to upskill workers in roles that are changing or are at risk of redundancy and we also supported local employers in creating a skills framework identifying key skills gaps at each level of data literacy and mapped training to the framework to help learners find the right training for them.