Versions Compared

Key

  • This line was added.
  • This line was removed.
  • Formatting was changed.
Panel
panelIconIdatlassian-note
panelIcon:note:
panelIconText:note:
bgColor#DEEBFF

On this page:

  1. What is User Experience, anyway?

  2. How does it support the Digital Plan & Code of Practice?

    • does anyone want to help write this section?

  3. How does it fit into the way we work?

    • does anyone want to help write this section?

  4. How are we practicing it at the Digital Academy?

    • does anyone want to help write this section?

1️⃣
What is User Experience, anyway?

If Service Design supports the operations necessary to deliver a good customer experience, how can we break down what makes a good experience?

Enter: the UX Honeycomb, developed by Peter Morville. Why this model? Gathering UX resources can be tricky — sometimes there is a private sector slant that makes the resources incomplete, or sometimes downright irresponsible, for public service contexts. Public sector design needs to consider risk, harm, and accessibility for all vs. profit, growth and competition (this is a biased oversimplification).

honeycomb w think feel use.webp
staircase of UX.png

*Please note, in practice the work isn’t quite as neat-and-tidy as the table below might suggest, e.g. practices that make an experience usable also make it credible. A disclaimer that the distinctions below are rigid for clarity, in practice the work is more fluid and intersectional.

THINK · What do users think about the product? Is it useful? Is it valuable? Do they find it credible?

USEFUL

VALUABLE

For an experience to be useful and valuable, we need to understand why we’re offering the experience (business) and why someone is interacting with it (user).

The experience needs to solve real, whole problems and have measurable impact.

What it entails:

FEEL · How do people feel about the product? Do they find it desirable? Also, do they feel it’s credible?

DESIRABLE

CREDIBLE

Often framed in terms of ‘visual aesthetics’, but can be so much more:

For someone to want, enjoy using, return to a product/service, and hopefully recommend it to others: we can layer in an understanding of how emotions impact the brain (e.g. stress and decision making, emotions and memory). The emotional ‘tone’ of our experience needs to match the context.

What it entails:

‘Desirable’ experiences involve almost everything in this table.

Broadly, trust in government is a hot topic these days. For the Academy, we’ll be building trust with IM/IT folks will be trusting looking for us to provide credible support for the very difficult work they’re often asked to do.

What it entails:

DO or USE · When it comes to actually using the product, is it findable, accessible and usable?

FINDABLE

ACCESSIBLE

USABLE

What it entails:

What it entails:

  • Universal Design

  • WCAG Accessibility

  • Inclusive Design Toolkit (Microsoft)

What it entails: