A Single, Secure Source of Truth
for Staff Capability
Built by someone who has spent over a decade building secure systems for police forces and public sector bodies. SkillDrill brings the same standard to workforce skills visibility.
The cost of not knowing
A rota gap during a shift change. An inspection that asks for evidence of staff competency you can't produce quickly. A near-miss that traces back to nobody knowing, in the moment, who had the right training.
These aren't hypothetical. They're the normal operating risk of not having a reliable, current, searchable record of what your workforce can actually do.
Capability hidden one department away
Wards, watches, service areas, directorates: each part of the organisation manages its own people in isolation. Valuable skills sit undiscovered just one team away, invisible to the people who need them most.
- Wards, watches and directorates in silos
- Skills sit undiscovered one team away
- Invisible to the people who need them
Inspection evidence scattered across spreadsheets
CQC, HMICFRS, internal audit: they all ask the same question. Can you show that your people have the right skills for their roles? Gathering that evidence manually is slow, inconsistent, and hard to keep current.
- CQC, HMICFRS and internal audit ask
- Manual gathering is slow and inconsistent
- Evidence goes stale between inspections
Gaps you only find when it's too late
A rota gap surfaces at handover. A retirement takes the only holder of a critical skill with it. Without a current record of who can do what, you discover the gap at exactly the moment you can least afford to.
- Rota gaps surface at handover
- Retirements take critical skills with them
- Found at the worst possible moment
A call comes in. You need a German speaker. Now.
Every force, trust and council has the skills somewhere in the organisation. Finding them in time is the hard part.
Phone the supervisor. Phone the language lead. Hope.
- "Who knows German on lates?" Three people get asked, none know.
- By the time someone remembers PC Reynolds did a tour with the Royal Military Police, the call's gone cold.
- Or you call an external interpreting line, wait, pay, and the witness has wandered off.
Type "german" into Skill Explorer. Two seconds.
- Every colleague with German on their profile appears instantly, with proficiency captured in their own words.
- Filter by department or location to narrow it to the people you can actually reach.
- The witness is being interviewed in their own language inside minutes, not hours.
Why NHS, councils and emergency services run differently, and why generic HR tools miss
Trusts, forces and authorities have specialist roles, shift-based availability, perishable qualifications, and time-critical decisions. SkillDrill is shaped around all four.
Specialist and clinical roles
PSU, AFO, dog handler, FLO, hazmat tech, custody nurse, prescriber, safeguarding lead. Capture who holds what, then filter Skill Explorer in seconds.
- PSU, AFO, dog handler, FLO
- Custody nurse, prescriber, safeguarding lead
- Filter Skill Explorer in seconds
Qualifications that expire
First aid, OST, resuscitation, advanced driving. Scheduled Catch-ups prompt people when a review is due, so the record stays current instead of decaying quietly.
- First aid, OST, resuscitation
- Advanced driving and refreshers
- Scheduled Catch-ups prompt reviews
Time-critical decisions
When minutes matter, ringing round supervisors is not a system. A single search of a current capability record is. That's the difference SkillDrill is built to make.
- One search, not a ring-round
- A current capability record
- Built for when minutes matter
Concern Flagging built in
Welfare or professional issues raised in conversation route straight to a named person in your organisation. Never buried in a transcript, never handled by AI alone.
- Routes to a named person
- Never buried in a transcript
- Never handled by AI alone
Audit-ready by default
A full audit trail across the platform. Defensible to your DPO, your information governance board, and whichever inspectorate asks next.
- Full audit trail platform-wide
- Defensible to your DPO
- Ready for the next inspectorate
Structured like you are
Directorates, stations, wards, service areas. Hierarchical structures mirror your org chart, so permissions and reporting make sense from day one.
- Directorates, stations, wards
- Mirrors your org chart
- Permissions that make sense day one
One living capability record, built for how public sector organisations actually work
SkillDrill gives you a single, searchable skills map that spans every directorate, ward and watch, making workforce planning proactive rather than reactive.
See capability across every department in one place
No more spreadsheets locked in service area silos. SkillDrill maps the skills of your entire workforce, from highways to housing, wards to watch rooms, so you can search, filter, and discover capabilities you never knew existed.
- Organisation-wide skills search across all departments
- Filter by service area, department, location, or skill category
- Spot transferable skills that unlock internal redeployment
- Hierarchical department structure mirrors your org chart
Housing & Communities
142 staff mapped
Urgent & Emergency Care
68 staff mapped
Children's Services
203 staff mapped
Response & Patrol
91 staff mapped
Walk into an inspection with the evidence already in hand
Inspections require clear evidence that your workforce has the skills and competencies to deliver safe, effective services. SkillDrill gives you a living, searchable record of staff capability that you can reference at any time, not a scramble the week before.
- Searchable skills data across your entire workforce
- Visual dashboards showing competency coverage by department
- Identify skills gaps before they become compliance risks
- Always up to date: Scheduled Catch-ups refresh profiles as skills evolve
"Well-led" and governance evidence
Demonstrate that you understand the skills within your workforce and have a process to keep that picture current
Skills audit trail
Every conversation is timestamped and stored, giving you a clear record of when skills were assessed
Gap analysis reporting
See exactly where competency gaps exist and prioritise training investment accordingly
Plan succession and internal mobility with confidence
Workforce planning depends on knowing who can step up when experienced staff move on. Career Pathways uses your existing capability data to support internal development and succession, strictly inside your own workforce: no CV screening, no candidate ranking, nothing that drifts into recruitment.
- Identify staff with skills aligned to critical roles
- Highlight skills gaps before they become vacancies
- Reduce reliance on costly agency cover and external consultants
- Support staff development and career progression internally
Search by skills needed for a role
Find staff who already have the capabilities a critical role requires
Spot single-holder risks
See where a critical capability rests with one person, before they retire or move on
Inform development conversations
Use skills data to guide career progression and training plans
Baseline digital and data skills before you transform
Transformation programmes succeed when you understand your starting point. SkillDrill gives programme leads a clear baseline of digital, data, and technical skills across the organisation, so you can target training investment, identify internal champions, and reduce dependency on external contractors.
- Baseline digital and data literacy across all service areas
- Identify digital champions and internal transformation leads
- Target training budgets where they will have the greatest impact
- Track capability growth as programmes progress
Data analysis & reporting
67%Cloud platforms & SaaS tools
52%Process automation
31%AI and machine learning
14%Percentage of staff with self-reported competence
Different people use it differently
Frontline staff and officers
Take a 10 to 15 minute AI Conversation about what they can do. The AI asks the right follow-ups: not "do you speak German?" but "how comfortable would you be taking a witness statement in German?". The result is a profile with real signal, not the box-ticked self-assessment everyone fudges.
- 10 to 15 minute AI Conversation
- Follow-ups that dig into real depth
- A profile with real signal
Control rooms, rota leads and service managers
Search Skill Explorer for the capability they need and see matching colleagues in seconds, with proficiency recorded in each person's own words and filters for department and location. No ringing round, no rota PDF, no waiting for the one person who knows everyone.
- Search by capability, not job title
- Proficiency in each person's own words
- Filters for department and location
Workforce planning, professional standards and HR
Skills intelligence that flags single-holder risks ("if one officer left tomorrow we'd lose our only Polish speaker"), ageing qualifications, and hidden capability across the organisation. Used at SLT meetings, in succession planning, and in transformation programmes.
- Single-holder risks flagged
- Ageing qualifications surfaced
- Hidden capability revealed
Built for how public sector actually procures
- UK data residency and per-tenant encryption, addressing the first question any information governance review will ask.
- Your own Azure tenancy option, removing a common sub-processor concern from procurement entirely for organisations already running Azure.
- GDPR compliant, full audit trail, Data Processing Agreement available.
- Founder background: over a decade building secure technology for police forces and public sector bodies, which shapes how this product is built, not just how it's described.
Read the trust and security detail
Encryption model, data flows, sub-processors, and current certification status, including Cyber Essentials Plus progress and the SOC 2 gap analysis. The full picture, not the marketing summary.
Open Trust & SecurityUK GDPR & DPA 2018
Clear data processing agreements, consent management, and subject access request support built in from the start.
- Clear data processing agreements
- Consent management built in
- Subject access request support
NHS DSPT compatible
Designed to align with NHS Data Security and Protection Toolkit standards for handling workforce data securely.
- Aligned with DSPT standards
- Secure workforce data handling
- Designed for NHS environments
AES-256 encryption
All data encrypted at rest with AES-256-GCM using per-tenant encryption keys. Data in transit protected with TLS 1.3.
- AES-256-GCM at rest
- Per-tenant encryption keys
- TLS 1.3 in transit
UK data residency
All data stored on UK-based servers. Your staff data never leaves the United Kingdom.
- UK-based servers only
- Data never leaves the UK
- Residency you can evidence
Ethical AI policy
Transparent AI usage with a published ethical AI policy. No data is used to train AI models. Staff know exactly how AI is involved.
- Published ethical AI policy
- No data used to train models
- Staff know how AI is involved
Role-based access
Granular permissions ensure staff only access the data they need. Admins control who sees what across departments.
- Granular permissions per role
- Access limited to what's needed
- Admin control across departments
Direct people to the right resources
After each conversation, SkillDrill shows relevant training links, support contacts, or next steps based on what was discussed. Configure rules to match skills, keywords, or welfare concerns to the right resources.
- Training links after each conversation
- Support contacts and next steps
- Rules for skills, keywords, concerns
Keep profiles fresh automatically
Set review intervals per question set. SkillDrill reminds people when a catch-up is due and carries forward their previous answers so they only update what has changed. New skills and qualifications are captured automatically.
- Review intervals per question set
- Previous answers carried forward
- New skills captured automatically
Three steps to a single source of truth
Getting started is straightforward. Most organisations are up and running within a day, with no IT integration required.
Set up your structure
Add your directorates, service areas, wards, stations, and staff. SkillDrill mirrors your org chart with hierarchical structures, so permissions and reporting make sense from day one.
Staff have AI Conversations
Each team member has a natural, 10 to 15 minute conversation with the AI. It adapts to their answers, exploring skills, experience, qualifications, and career interests in depth.
Explore, analyse, and act
Search and filter skills across every department in Skill Explorer. Identify gaps, plan succession, and use real skills data to support inspections, workforce strategies, and service redesign.
What this looks like in practice
A single, searchable record of staff and volunteer capability, instead of separate spreadsheets held by separate teams.
- One record for staff and volunteers
- Searchable across every team
- No more scattered spreadsheets
Find who's current on a specific competency in seconds during an inspection or an incident, instead of chasing it down after the fact.
- Competency answers in seconds
- Ready during inspections
- Ready during incidents
Concern flagging routes any welfare or professional issue raised in conversation straight to a named person, never left buried or handled by AI alone.
- Welfare issues routed immediately
- Professional concerns tracked
- A person decides, not the AI
Career Pathways supports internal workforce planning without introducing any CV screening or candidate-ranking functionality, which keeps this squarely inside internal workforce visibility, not recruitment.
- Internal workforce planning only
- No CV screening
- No candidate ranking
Frequently asked questions
Yes. Organisations already using their own Azure tenancy can keep all AI processing inside infrastructure they already govern.
No. SkillDrill sits alongside your existing systems and gives you a searchable view of capability across your workforce. It isn't a training records platform.
Cyber Essentials Plus is in progress, and a SOC 2 gap analysis is underway. See Trust & Security for the full current picture.
Yes. We're happy to engage early, including pre-procurement conversations, pilot scoping, and information governance questions.
Ready for a single, secure source of truth?
Talk to us about a pilot for a department, a directorate, or a whole organisation. We're happy to engage early, well before procurement formally begins.