The University of Pretoria held its first digital transformation strategy launch session on Hatfield campus today. The digital transformation strategy is the result of a two-year long process which saw the University’s leadership team, together with an external consultant, craft a strategy and a strategic roadmap to enhance the institution’s digital environment and cement its position as a University of the future.

Embracing digital transformation falls within the University of Pretoria’s strategic plan for 2022-2026, which highlights the need to adapt to uncertainty, turn threats into opportunities, and introduce innovative technologies – all of which will help achieve the vision to be a leading research-intensive university in Africa, recognised internationally for its quality, relevance, and impact, and also for developing people, creating knowledge, and making a difference locally and globally. The digital transformation strategy will not only increase the institution’s efficiency and effectiveness, improving operations on a large scale and attracting top academic staff and students globally, but it will benefit the lives of staff, students, alumni, and the broader society.

In higher education, digital transformation is defined as using digital technologies to better serve customers, and improve and streamline operational performance. The University has two beneficiaries which are impacted differently by digital transformation – students and staff – with a unique vision required for each. For students, it’s about building an integrated, inclusive, and enabling environment that will support their success, preparing them for the technological future of work and giving them the opportunity to regularly upskill through the University of Pretoria as their chosen institution throughout their careers. Staff require digital support and literacy, multiple integrated platforms that enable staff mobility and data-driven lectures, and an effective and efficient administrative eco-system as the University builds its digital footprint internally and externally.

The digital transformation strategy defines five goals together with objectives and key actions that are aligned to these goals. The first goal is to create a digitally transformed culture, where pioneering innovation promotes agility and collaboration. Achieving this goal requires a digital literacy audit to determine the level of digital fitness across the institution, whereafter ongoing change management, awareness and training initiatives can be implemented to drive digital skills development. The second goal is to establish a customer-centric business model that drives a positive customer experience, which entails identifying business processes to be automated, prioritising and budgeting them, and then following through with implementation. The third goal relates to digital work optimisation, which can be brought about by embedding key digital competencies into job descriptions, developmental plans, and talent management recruitment activities in order to generate a new digital savvy workforce.

The fourth goal is to leverage the University’s digital transformation competitiveness to strengthen its responsiveness and impact in society. The tertiary education landscape was dramatically impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, which brought about an accelerated need for digital solutions to enable meeting, communicating, teaching, and learning. The University of Pretoria and other leading universities were able to transition almost seamlessly to virtual learning, and support students living in areas with no internet reception or access to electricity. The crisis further exposed the digital divide that exists in South Africa, and emphasised the opportunity that digital technology presents to address societal fault lines of poverty and inequality, and shift an unskilled or semi-skilled population to skilled and knowledge work. The University of Pretoria recognises the potential for universities to help tackle significant societal challenges locally, in Africa, and globally, and its digital transformation efforts take this into account.

The fifth goal is to use technology to optimise the University’s core competencies of teaching, learning and research. It is about driving technology adoption and creating shared understanding through data literacy interventions and self-service digital support; and incentivising the sharing and transparency of data, so that maximum benefit is derived and ensured.

The process of developing the University of Pretoria’s digital transformation strategy has allowed for a reflection of current digital milestones and has been an opportunity to conceptualise, redefine and reposition the way forward in order to remain relevant, agile, and competitive. The road ahead will entail radical change, and so the digital transformation strategy really does mark the beginning of a new era for the University of Pretoria. Onward and upward!

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