09. August 2022
author:
Martin Jordan |
Carina Haumering |
Charlotte Vorbeck
How we understand and involve users in the development process
Administrative services only work for users if they are designed according to their needs. Understanding these needs requires user research.
International studies spanning decades show that large-scale IT projects most often fail due to a lack of input from users. This is because the involvement of users is the decisive factor in the success of such projects.
The importance of directly and regularly involving users in the development of new services has also been recognized by the German administration. The service standard presented by the Federal Ministry of the Interior and Community in summer 2020 – a guide for all stakeholders at federal, state and local level in the development and optimization of digital administrative services as part of the implementation of the Online Access Act (OZG) and beyond – lists user centricity as the top principle. This states that users should be involved through interviews, usability tests of existing services or interdisciplinary workshops.
With DigitalService, this happens early on in the discovery phase. At the beginning of a project, this serves to understand users and their goals, identify obstacles, categorize political goals and uncover opportunities for improvement. User research plays a central role here and combines quantitative and qualitative data. While quantitative data reveals the what, qualitative data often explains the why.
In later phases, when a product or administrative service is under development and even after the service is available to everyone, users are continuously involved. For example, the next usability test for our service for submitting property tax returns, which was launched at the beginning of July, took place less than a week later.
Martin Jordan
works as Head of Design at DigitalService. Previously, he was Head of Service Design at the Cabinet Office in London for over six years. There, at the Government Digital Service, he pushed forward the digital transformation of the British administration and its administrative services. In his private life, he loves porridge. His goal is to compete in the Porridge World Cup at some point and win the Golden Spurtle, the Scottish stirring spoon.
Carina Haumering
works as a UX designer at DigitalService. She studied communication design and worked in Deutsche Bahn's innovation lab after completing her studies. There she helped to develop future visions for sustainable mobility, designed prototypes and carried out qualitative user studies. In the "Zivilgerichtliches Online-Verfahren" project, she is responsible for identifying the needs of citizens and court employees and incorporating them into product development. She uses the findings from user research to continuously iterate designs and prototypes. In her free time, Carina is passionate about traveling by train and bike through Germany and Europe.
Charlotte Vorbeck
is a UX Designer with a technical background. She spent the first ten years of her career as a front-end developer for apps, websites, and games before moving into the user experience field. She is passionate about building technology that solves real problems for real users by combining context, empathy, and design tools with the art of software development. In addition to technology, Charlotte loves to cook and bake for friends, dance in any way she can, or rediscover the world with her two daughters.
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