Innovation Tag: Service Design

The former municipality of Molenwaard was the Netherlands’ first local council to operate without a town hall. This innovation came about when three local authorities merged together into one municipality. Despite becoming a much larger municipality they still wanted to stay close to the community. They decided to no longer have a service desk in the traditional sense of the concept. Instead, the local authority goes out into the community and is, therefore, always nearby.

The Heating Assistance Rebate Program (HARP) helps over 42,000 low income Nova Scotians with the high cost of heating their homes in the winter. In 2016 Service Nova Scotia used an innovative approach to modernize HARP from a paper-based application to an online system to improve user experience and government processes. The modernization of this program was uniquely user-driven with significant user-testing leading the transition process and continuous user-testing for ongoing improvement.

In 2016 the NEB launched the Data Visualization Initiative to face the challenge of producing usable and useful data to go beyond using new technologies to deliver better service to citizens. It created multiple products from the same information to expand public participation in the energy dialogue and enable evidence-based decision-making. These products include interactive data visualizations and other materials, such as high school lesson plans, as a new way to engage experts and nonexperts.

The Australian government is transforming employment services to improve how the system works for job seekers, employers and the community. Transformational change requires genuine consultation to capture the diversity of views of stakeholders affected by changes, identifying pain points, testing ideas and laying the groundwork for sustainable policy reform. A citizen centric approach helps to understand the real-world impact, leading to better outcomes and greater acceptance in the community.

Community Connects is a pilot project that came out of the Transportation Innovation Lab. Problem/Opportunity: Cape Breton Regional Municipality (CBRM) is a region with high levels of poverty and unemployment. Innovation: Taxi service, doorstep pick-up, defined drop-off points, flat rate: $7 seat. Why innovative? In short, the approach (social innovation lab) and those that were engaged (first-voice participants).

The Client Centric Policy Playbook strengthens the ability to engage clients in the design of program and service policies. Through extensive engagement with policy experts and employees on-the-ground, the Playbook has brought together innovative best practices, tools and resources for engaging clients. This solution enhances client experience by giving clients an opportunity to be part of the policy generation process and by ensuring that programs and services are reflective of their needs.

The Client Experience Measurement Survey Model was developed by Employment and Social Development Canada to gather and analyse client feedback to improve service delivery to its clients. Canadians have been able to express their views on government programs and services, which have informed the way programs and services are designed and delivered.  The survey allows the tracking of service satisfaction, ease of access, effectiveness of service delivery, and the experience of particular programs…

With a citizen-centric approach and a strong focus on co-creation, SIMPLEX is a simplification and modernization program focused on improving public service efficiency and designed to facilitate the citizens and businesses everyday life, and their interaction with the public administration. Launched in 2006, it had several editions since then and resulted in the implementation of hundreds of initiatives that cut red tape, reduced context costs and used ICT to deliver better public services.

Adur and Worthing Councils implemented a low code development platform to help them take control of their digital transformation. A small digital team is building end-to-end user-centred digital services that are replacing expensive and inflexible legacy systems. Low cost, fast and flexible, this pioneering digital strategy has delivered multiple customer and efficiency benefits, won national awards and central government recognition.

The integration of health and social care was seen by the Scottish government to require support to ensure that benefits of both national and local data and knowledge were able to be shared across two very different cultures and service providers to jointly develop more appropriate services for local populations. LIST using their expertise in analytical work was seen as a way to develop a sound evidence base to allow decision makers to develop effective services.