National Health Service

Over 270 staff members of the National Health Service (NHS) in the UK attended CM-Alliance’s flagship, NCSC-Certified Cyber Incident Planning and Response training over a course of three months. Out of this, nearly 260 employees of the 200+ NHS trusts sat for the optional examination at the end of the course, administered by APMG International and invigilated by ProctorU. Upon successfully passing the exam, course attendees also received digital badges which act as a secure, digital representation of their professional credentials.

Feedback

The course participants benefitted from a unique blended learning format which included over 16 live training sessions with an acclaimed cybersecurity practitioner as well as recorded e-learning content. The live training enhanced the knowledge pool of course attendees tremendously as they also got the chance to interact with other participants and share thought leadership, leading to greater engagement. 

One of the main attributes of the course that stood out for the NHS delegates was the relevance of the course content and how readily applicable in real-life scenarios the training is. The balance between technical and business aspects emerged as another key highlight in the feedback shared. 

Stephen Dutton elaborated on this idea: “I would definitely recommend this course as it makes you think differently about the challenges facing your organisation, working carefully to deal with all the known risks to protect yourself before approaching the unknowns. The tutor is brilliant, fully engaging and makes what could be a dull subject come to life!” 

“The CIPR training was a bit of a lightbulb moment for me, it expanded several concepts I had been working on and gave me a more focussed direction in some areas where I had been casting my net too widely. The CM-Alliance approach to CIPR is no-nonsense and removes a lot of the unnecessary information we thought we needed. For example, we don't need a 70-page incident response plan. We need a concise document that people can understand. I want my colleagues and managers to do this training,” said Richard Watson of Berkshire Healthcare NHS Trust. 

Gary Ingham said, “Good informative course which was well worth my time investment and I have taken away and implemented some of the suggestions made.”