Design: user-oriented

WRITTEN ON Friday, November 27th, 2009 BY William Heath AND STORED IN Across the Board, Design: user-oriented, Foundation of Trust, Political engagement, Save Time and Money, Transformational Government, What do we want?

@NTOUK and @williamheath are heartily fed up with half-baked government IT strategies. Having to read the current proposal is the last straw. Modernising Govt promised the same in 1999. The 2009 draft Government ICT Strategy – New world, new challenges, new opportunities seems oddly detached from the pressing discussions under way about public services renewal. […]


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WRITTEN ON Thursday, November 26th, 2009 BY William Heath AND STORED IN Across the Board, Design: Co-creation, Design: user-oriented, Pertinent Art

Loved every minute I attended of the mypublicservices09 event. After Malmo09 that’s two DIY public-services events in two weeks. They feel natural, creative, fun and important. It struck me that this time the powerful voices of the enegetic idealists were joined by a good number of public servants. Together we spoke of the same things […]


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WRITTEN ON Saturday, November 21st, 2009 BY William Heath AND STORED IN Design: Co-creation, Design: user-oriented, Political engagement, Save Time and Money, What do we want?

David Osimo and Paul Johnston brought the voice of the public into the last day of the official Malmo eGov2009 proceedings. Here’s their video of different people reading their crowd-sourced open declaration: Must have been a good coup de theatre – Ton says it raised a round of applause. Paul recorded me doing one section […]


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WRITTEN ON Friday, May 15th, 2009 BY William Heath AND STORED IN Design: Co-creation, Design: user-oriented, What do we want?

A query from Deborah at thinkpublic is always something to follow up: The NHS Institute, together with Involve and Thinkpublic are currently looking at the ways in which new technology can be used to involve patients, staff and public in health decisions. We would like to learn more about: whether you already use technologies to […]


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WRITTEN ON Sunday, May 3rd, 2009 BY William Heath AND STORED IN Design: user-oriented, Save Time and Money, Transformational Government, We told you so..., What do we want?

Oh dear oh dear. Head teachers say that stupid, bossy, intrusive, overcentralised poorly-designed pne-size-fits-all bureacracy is making it harder to get help to vulnerable kids (BBC): The NAHT say a small-scale study among their officials in eight local authorities, representing 1000 schools, found that no-one thought the new system, known as the Common Assessment Framework […]


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WRITTEN ON Saturday, March 28th, 2009 BY Richard S AND STORED IN Design: user-oriented, Save Time and Money, What do we want?

Oh dear, what a disappointment: This online service provided via a PFI, for filing irrelevant but compulsory company data online, doesn’t work with ordinary PCs. Disclaimer: There’s no-one “at home” on the “help” desk, outside office hours. So I may have got this wrong.


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WRITTEN ON Friday, February 20th, 2009 BY Ruth Kennedy AND STORED IN Design: user-oriented, What do we want?

Yes, there are things about UK travel websites that are annoying (eg why does The Trainline INSIST that you select ’00’ minutes, when you have indicated that you want to find a train that departs or arrives on the hour??). BUT nothing beats a bit of mystery shopping to remind you that things really aren’t […]


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WRITTEN ON Wednesday, February 18th, 2009 BY Ruth Kennedy AND STORED IN Design: user-oriented, Foundation of Trust, What do we want?

Celebration where celebration’s due: it must be seen as extremely IDEAL to receive a tax rebate on Feb 4th from a tax return filed on January 29th. Well done HMRC – or at least Kenny C, inspector of taxes at Lothian. Now let’s get the rest of it sorted: like those dreadful phone calls I […]


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WRITTEN ON Monday, January 19th, 2009 BY Ruth Kennedy AND STORED IN Design: user-oriented, What do we want?

Oh no. How very disappointing. I’m trying to help the government by completing my self assessment for 07-08 online. I’m trying to be good and early-ish (there’s 2 weeks to go and I am here, with all the paperwork, ready to log in to the Government Gateway using that remarkably unmemorable pin number. BUT! I […]


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WRITTEN ON Wednesday, January 7th, 2009 BY William Heath AND STORED IN Design: Co-creation, Design: user-oriented, Save Time and Money, Transformational Government, What do we want?

Hurrah. I see from Kablenet that Directgov has appointed three new directors. Injection of fresh blood is just what DirectGov needs. Obviously we need wonderful, clear, well designed online services. DirectGov, the “flagship” has fallen into a dark place of editorialising in a broadcasting PR monotone, backed with a self-referential and hilariously inept search service. […]


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