Designing for Civil Society

Taking public users - and systems - seriously

Louise Ferguson, over at City of Bits, uses a Demos publication about generalists versus specialists in the public sector to spark a mini-rant about the lack of people in public agencies interested in user-centred design/user experience/usability. The publication by Ed Straw had been blogged by Sophia Parker who suggests:
"Perhaps then what we need are civil servants who are specialists in systems and process design. In other words, people who are able to craft a process that is designed to include as many people as possible to participate in the creation of value."

Life is messy - so let's be honest about it

How far can we plan communities, organisations, our lives... and how far should we expect to go with the flow of what happens? Old question, but do we have any new answers?
"No plan survives first engagement with the enemy" said von Clausewitz.
As a consultant it is tempting to run workshop groups through exercises that promise a business plan, action plan, routemap. Tasks are identified, timescales laid out, responsibilities assigned....then reality hits as soon as everyone gets out of the door.

Making changes in messy systems

A lot of my work involves community engagement programmes, partnership processes or other initiatives where many of different agencies or interests have to collaborate towards some common goals if anything much is to be achieved. There's lots of stakeholders in the system... but all to often the more powerful agencies (and their consultants) act is if they could play God and just move everyone around. So surveys are done, analyses carried out, recommendations made, reports written ... and surprise, little changes. I suggest instead taking a "systems approach" - without really knowing as much as I should what that means. I can usually cover by proposing a game or simulation that helps people play through the options.