Building an expert, empowered workforce
Our overarching principle is ‘augmenting humans’. This means deploying AI to empower employees by supplementing and enhancing their human abilities and skills – not to replace them.
We place a high value on the human elements of empathy and judgment: we see AI solutions working in a complementary way where repetitive, and often mundane tasks are undertaken by technology, with the overall experience administration led by humans. With AI, improvements to client tools and internal processes free up time for colleagues so they can focus on the tasks that matter for our clients and their customers. And by streamlining workflows and activities, our people are empowered to work smarter, faster and better, and to take on more creative, human-centred responsibilities.
Our new technology platforms and Generative AI are already creating a better employment experience and greater job satisfaction for Capita colleagues; by equipping and enabling our people with the tools and training they need to be successful, the service delivery teams are able to increase their own productivity whilst continuing to offer personalised experiences to our client’s customers and citizens. Our approach also offers considerable personal development opportunities as we invest in upskilling our people with the necessary AI skills to succeed and to be the workforce of the future.
Sameer Vuyyuru, Capita’s Chief AI and Product Officer
The creation of this new role – Chief AI and Product Officer - underscores Capita’s commitment to our technology and digital strategy which is a key driver of our strategic transformation and vision.
Bringing over 25 years’ experience in the global technology sector including, most recently, his role at Amazon Web Services (AWS) as Director, Global Solutions and Partnerships, Telco and Edge Strategy, Sameer is responsible for overseeing and accelerating Capita’s AI, product and solution strategy and leveraging our hyperscaler relationships.
I’m thrilled to have joined the Capita team, and I’m incredibly excited about the ways we can apply AI to our business to redefine the traditional business processing market and modernise the delivery of private and public sector services.
Empowering our people to work smarter, faster, better
Copilot is helping colleagues to automate routine tasks, summarise complex documents and draft content. GitHub, an AI-powered coding assistant that helps to write better code, faster, is enabling 200 of our developers to focus on the more intricate and innovative aspects of software development, driving efficiency and productivity. This is already delivering greater job satisfaction and we’ve received exceptionally positive feedback from employees whose roles are AI-enhanced.
Augmenting Capita's dedicated, talented workforce
Our people are naturally highly motivated and come to work wanting to help the citizens and customers they speak with every day. As our new AI solutions enable contact centre agents, front-line support staff, managers and leaders to deliver even greater results, there’s high demand from other employees to be trained on, and have access to, AI tools to improve how they work.
It’s working in practice already…
AgentSuite, currently used by some contact centre agents, has been transformative - agents have been able to reduce the average handling time of customer enquiries by more than 20% and increase their ability to resolve calls first time round by more than 15%.
More time for complex tasks
By completing repetitive and manual tasks, and synthesising information to make it more accessible for our employees, AI allows our people to focus on more creative, human-centred tasks.
Better citizen and customer experiences
With more time available for complex tasks which require empathy and problem-solving, these higher-quality citizen and customer interactions result in the delivery of better, more efficient experiences and outcomes.
It’s working in practice already…
We’re driving widescale adoption of Generative AI coding assistants to enable our technology teams to accelerate speed to deployment and innovate at scale. Github has resulted in productivity improvements of up to 25% for our developers.
We’re seizing the opportunity to upskill and build on the technical capabilities within our teams. Technological advances mean that the workforce of the future will need to have a higher level of technical know-how and skills so it’s crucial that we ensure the next generation of our workforce has those skills and abilities, to thrive in an increasingly tech-led workplace. That’s why we're investing heavily in upskilling our people with the necessary AI expertise, providing continuous training and education opportunities.
But we know the adoption of AI tools isn’t always easy for all employees. That’s why we ensure AI training works for everyone, taking into consideration the diverse and disparate geographic spread of our workforce, and the fundamental need for training to evolve as AI technologies evolve.
In 2024 we launched three levels of AI training that cater to the different requirements of our workforce:
AI training for all employees
As part of our foundational Data and Technology Academy, all employees can access self-directed training on the basics of AI.
Enhanced AI skills for tech-focused roles
For those employees engaged in tech-related roles, we provide a dedicated and accredited training programme run in partnership with our hyperscaler partners, such as Microsoft and Amazon Web Services.
AI Apprenticeships
Our new AI training Academy provides employees with a one-year accredited AI apprenticeship on ‘AI for Business Value’ to help employees identify business value gains that can be achieved through using AI, and how to execute AI projects ethically. This pilot programme is run in partnership with Multiverse, a tech company delivering high-quality training through applied learning.
Watch the video to hear from colleagues currently undertaking the AI for Business Value apprenticeship →
