5. “The senior team at Cork County
Council wanted to improve
customer and staff outcomes
county-wide and set up a centre
to use and showcase service
design approaches.
With a council in the process of
‘going digital’ we saw an
opportunity to ensure services
were led by user needs.”
James Fogarty, Deputy Chief Executive
13. 250
Reps a month
15 minutes to process
each one
5
Hours to process the
reps daily
3
Day acknowledgement
KPI with a
10 day response time
wasn’t being met
The situation was ….
19. Customers meet
directly with Public
Rep or with staff in
their office.
Liaise with reps
one to one, over
phone/email to
offer advise and
answer and
questions
Email confirmation
15 mins per
application
Scanning
paperwork
System very slow.
Checks info
available
Norma emails user
to advise query is
waiting for them to
answer. Chases
user to answer.
Further information
sought through Norma
or system updated
Not everyone updates
system
Councillor gets
acknowledged for
work done
Norma checks
data on CCS and
ihouse
Email,
Post,
Face to Face
Clinics/Office
Phone
Email
Post
Face to Face
Telephone
Email
Face to Face
Emaill
Post
CCS System
Scanning documentation
CCS System
Internal Post
Email
Excel Spreadsheets
iHouse
Phone Email Email
Post
Clinics/Office
Phone
Email
Post
Face to Face
STAGESTORYBORADFEELINGTOUCHPOINTINTERACTION
Local Rep meets
Constituent
Local Rep
Contacts CCC
Norma confirm
receipt.
Norma inputs
data into
System
CCC forwards
query to relevant
dept
Dept answers query,
looks for further
information &
updates system
Dept advises
Norma of updates
CCC advises
local rep of
updates
Local Rep contacts
constituent
20. “It is time consuming to document, scan and upload
original correspondence onto CCS system takes
approx. 15 mins. Excluding the time involved
chasing staff for answers, sending confirmation and
other correspondences”
- Norma, Housing Department
21. Lack of clarity on what
information is actually
needed and useful to
submit a representation
● Elected representatives send in
everything they think is relevant
● Photos are not required by Council
staff
● Lack of clarity around what is
and is not required to process
a representation
22. TD’s (which is the Government elected
member) make a higher amount of
representations than local councillors
Councillors (Local Elected Members)
can ‘shine a light’ on individual cases
of citizens
24. Re-designing the service:
Great engagement from
elected members and staff
● Ran prototyping workshops to
design what information is needed
● Breaking down the content
● Co-designing the needs across
different users
25. Language was important
Senior management recognised how
important the language was when
we walked through the service
visually in the co-design workshop
26. Usability Testing:
Testing our design with
elected members
Usability testing on the YourCouncil.ie
(Firmstep platform) allowed us to
quickly test our designs and find out
what worked and what didn’t before
going live
27. Prototyping straight into live
Prototyping on our customer
experience platform allowed us to
tweak continuously and then go
immediately live
28. Processing Reps
The processing of documents by
housing policy reduced from 15
minutes to less than 2 minutes per
rep. In most cases elected members
are submitting relevant documents.
This means roughly a week of time
saved per administrative staff member
per month.
86%Decrease in time spent processing
29. Instant Response
The reps are getting instant
acknowledgements – they
were previously waiting weeks
despite having a KPI of 3 days.
Nearly 75% of responses can
be answered straightaway once
they’re in the system.
100%Decrease in time spent waiting for
acknowledgement
30. Data Dashboard
A Dashboard is now always available which
saves ½ day a month (6 days a year) in
preparing a report for the Development
Committee
½Day a month saving in
preparing data
31. €1Saving on every acknowledgement
and response
Cost Savings in postage
There is a cost saving in postage of
€1 per acknowledgment and
response.
This is a saving duplicated for the
council and the elected members.
We think this is roughly €12,000 a
year in savings for the council and
elected members
32. Cost Savings in staff
We’ve cleared the backlog so much
so that the staff member we had been
working with has been freed up to
work on other projects and initiatives
two days a week. 2Days a week for staff
members now free
33. The real value of the service
emerged through this work
Reps are service co-producers in supporting some of the
most vulnerable and marginalised in our communities.
34. We’ve hooked housing
Our short intervention created an appetite for more Service
Design. We’re now looking at repairs, enquiries and grants.
36. Winning Hearts and Minds
“For me, the greatest part of the process had to be changing people’s mind-
sets. Initially we weren’t given the go-ahead to work with elected members.
After taking senior management in housing through the process, they got
onboard, organised information and training workshops. I skipped back to the
office”
Karen Fitzgerald, Customer Service Transformation Team
37. Where now?
Multiple projects underway
using Service Design
approaches
From library services to flood risk,
planning to environmental reporting
38. We’re now collecting
and analysing data on
what works
We can follow transactions by
service users to continuously
tweak our services and we are
in control.
Data is our new material.
39. We’re creating the
business case to feed
upstream.
We’re analysing our
performance against
Government digital standards,
and producing reports
contrasting service
performance and maintenance
possibility pre and post design.
40. Where now?
Wider strategy for
embedding design
Taking a holistic approach to
developing the capability inside the
organisation
42. Making Service Design stick
What we learned from the reality of
delivering new services through to live
43. Dormant
Unconscious
incompetence
The organisation doesn't
recognise it isn't performing or
where weaknesses lie.
Design deficit
No resource for design or
literacy to recognise the value
Starting Block
Conscious
incompetence
The organisation are making
the first steps to improve and
are at the planning stage of
how to do this.
Clean Slate
Solo lead or one design expert,
often organisation will be
smothering this person to a
clear goal to scale or build a
team
Sprinting
Active Unconscious
Incompetence
Have started trying to improve,
but are doing more harm than
good through unfocused
efforts.
Lift and Shift
Small team focusing on user-
centred approaches and
service improvement to a
dedicated team offering a
UX/CX service across the
business
Stretching
Conscious
incompetence
The organisation are making
active positive improvements
and have a scalable plan in
place to develop their
capabilities.
Design as a service
Small UX/CX team working on
products and services offering
skills across departments and
teams to a solidified and
scalable model for growing
capability org wide
Running
Unconscious
competence
The organisation have scaled
their approach across
departments and teams with
competence growing in
improving products and
services and building a
sustainable approach.
Embedded Design
literacy
Larger UX/CX centralised team
working on products and
services and other
departments start using
embedded designers, work
across multiple groups full
time. Non designer move to
design literate in the business.
Moving to non designers
becoming design fluid.
Pacing
Conscious
competence
The organisation are using
user-centred approaches
across all areas of the
organisation and literacy is
high across all teams.
User-centred organisation
Design is alive and living
across all processes internal to
the business. The end users
are always considered and
projects are delayed if the
design isn't delightful.
Consistent conscious act of
ensuring the sustainability of
the user-centred approach
across the whole organisation.
Learning
Style
Typical
Approach
Design
Capacity
44. A centralised team can begin as
agitators and influence others
The CST team in this context are
agitators, spreading the approach
45. Don’t make assumptions and map the
dark matter
Don’t always think people don’t want
to do this or it can’t be done, be
strategic in understanding the dark
matter and find ways around barriers
46. The projects need to land
We need ownership through service
managers or product owners to ‘own’
the service. Find who these owners
are.
47. Find the right people for the job
If Senior Management Team put
people onto projects, they have to be
the ‘right’ people for the job. Find the
people who really want to make
change happen.
48. Build and grow external networks
Look at your development pipeline of
talent and building the network to
bring them in-house/work alongside
you
49. Build a consistent playbook
Playbooks are great but don’t focus too
much on the tools. Build the playbook
as you deliver services.
50. Speak the right language
Speak in the terms and terminology
that people feel comfortable with.
Don’t complicate it, keep it simple.
51. Don’t ‘be the agency’.
Help build the capacity in the
organisation in their language, their
tools on their terms.
52. Support from both ends
You need senior level buy-in but
nurture a grassroots agenda to grow
the movement
53. Have a strategy that looks ahead
Map your service needs and what
citizens need to do to prioritise your
resource
54. Build the sustainable design products
Recognise the central team, in time,
will need to refocus their effort on
building scalable products for design
56. Use live projects to train
They highlight the actual reality of
scoping, designing and delivering a live
service
57. Work live and learn as you go
Let people have the space and time to
learn as they go
Build live in the platforms you will go
live
58. Impact over ‘case study’
Don’t get obsessed with service design
to ‘show the process’.
Show the impact.
59.
60. This may seem small, but this is
only 1 of 600 services, and a
snapshot of what Service Republic
will do.
The reality of delivering services in local government is
tough but this start has been transformational for us.
There is a risk with any digital transformation work that a lift and shift attitude creeps in. This is where no design work is built in to understand the user needs and best way to service it. We try to maintain focus on the overall service first, the model and what user need it is meeting, not replicating a bad exiting process online.
(00s) Roger Martin has focused on early noughties to document CEOs like Klaudia Kotcha turning profits around through ‘embedding’ designers in the business.
(2009) Embedding design - Emily Campbell
(2007) - SDS
2008 - SILK innovation lab Sophia Parker
Opening page: Keep the text hierarchy here. Title 120pt / Subtitle 72pt / Speaker 36pt
We supported to design the overall structure of what the centre might do, firstly we felt most important to focus on improving actual services within the council, and doing this live.
The CST team had already been developing digital versions of their transactional services on yourcouncil.ie. This created a good place to root our design work as we knew we could move fairly quickly to develop prototypes of new services.
There are over 80+ services on the platform
We worked with the newly formed Customer Service Team who had links with the digital and corporate services and other departments across the council.
The team all had good relationships with departments across the council, so these connections were really good for forming a team who would support the customer service transformation and the ‘Firmstep’ project.
Our absolute focus was on building what we call, a user-centered organisation. An organisation that helps both its customers (in this case citizens) to do what they need to do well, easily and efficiently and their staff
There is a risk with any digital transformation work that a lift and shift attitude creeps in. This is where no design work is built in to understand the user needs and best way to service it. We try to maintain focus on the overall service first, the model and what user need it is meeting, not replicating a bad exiting process online.
We had settled on considering working with Housing, and the learning lunches had provided buy-in.
The CST were then approached by Deirdre & Norma from housing department after they saw the www.yourcouncil.ie site and the options for ‘Ask a Question’. Could we look at similar service for Housing Reps? They knew CCS system is old and very time consuming.
After a few meetings, CST went to project sponsors – James, Niall & Tim Lucey to make a case for Housing Reps – that it would promotes site and engages councillors, gets Housing on board (wide range of staff – all levels) and is a ‘real project’ for training. Will get ‘real results’.
Will make excellent case study – was confident we can solve or improve all the issues raised if not more!
KPI wasn’t being met
1 month backlog
The Process covered Discovery and Alpha as explained previously
Stakeholder mapping – mapped elected members journey, housing policy and staff in other areas
Interviews –all staff were happy to participate but did open up more when we weren’t recording it. Mapped out each interviewees journey to document their interaction with existing service. Took note of any insights, opportunities and barriers mentioned – documented common themes, etc..
Personas represent the stakeholders – staff member housing policy, elected members (x2 – those with/without web), staff in other housing areas, etc.
Blueprinting is mapping out the process and ensuring each persona can engage and fits into the process.
Prototyping – drawing up rough idea of how form and process will look. This was very hands on with housing policy
Co – Design Workshop – attended by Senior management. looks at the language of the form, order, ensure we’re meeting all requirements, finalising decisions, validation of ideas etc.
User Testing/Research – rolled out to Housing Policy to clear back log. Excellent feedback from Housing Policy and elected members – Kevin O'Keeffe's office suggesting changing wording and layout of acknowledgements and responses and Sean Sherlock's’ office wanted the email option included for constituents.
Review Meetings with Housing Policy have kept us up to date on any changes/requests. Really valuable input has made it a success.
Currently working with housing staff to improve the end to end experience for citizens using the council website, providing access to information, FAQ’s etc before onlne forms.
First Discovery workshop well attended by Housing Staff, run by CST with support from Snook
This was an open discussion and most staff were engaged
Stakeholder mapping was interesting.
When we first mapped stakeholders with Padraig & Karen we had approx. 10-15. When we did it with the bigger group we had 60+. Stakeholder mapping is a valuable tool as it lets staff know how many people they actually do interact with – can be morale boosting to see how many they are influencing and impacting.
From here, we mapped user journeys, identified key touchpoints, interactions and possible barriers.
Staff have been amazing. Very forthcoming and willing to engage and participate.
Spoke with football club chairperson, school princiapl, community groups, tidy towns, parents association, elected members, etc
Local reps meet constituents and on their behalf then contact the council. Norma, who is the main administrator at the front end of this proce then puts the data into the CCS system. CCC then forward the query to who they think the relevant individual and department is, department answers and updates information and systems and then advises Norma of the update. CCC then advise the local rep of the update and the local rep then contact the constituent.
Elected representatives send in everything they think is relevant
Photos are not required by Council staff
Lack of clarity around what is & is not required to process a rep
There are lots of small detailed solutions we created as a team to develop a better, streamlined service that meets user needs. We standardised and outlined what data actually needed to be collected, we digitised elements of the service to streamline where reps were being stored and analysed and we provided a digital channel for reps to remove paperwork. We also provided guidance materials to representatives on what to expect and submit. By blueprinting, we were also able to clarify the roles of housing staff at different stages of the process.
The online form is ensuring a level of data integrity with drop down menus, compulsory fields, consistent field names, secure routing etc. This helps with the reporting aspect. Staff were spending half a day month compiling stats and figures from emails and excel spreadsheets, that’s been automated for them too with various parameters – see below.
Technical Capacity
Track the history of reps, identify repeat reps
View responses to previous reps
One repository for all reps made
‘Oversight’ view / role for Housing Policy Unit over all reps logged
Recording of all reps for measurement KPIs & management reporting
Quantify the number of repeat reps
Identity
Identify customers easily, one applicant record, up to date details.
Clarification around Housing Options
Make assessment criteria clearer
Send Housing Reps directly to section responsible (Maintenance & Grants)
Standardise information in responses & make current and relevant
Set the standard for collecting information on reps
Distinguish between ‘standard reps’ and ‘emergency’ cases
Reduce use of paper and use of multiple IT systems
Look at additional email addresses for directing reps as appropriate
Clarify and the roles and responsibilities of Housing staff.
The engagement from our elected members has been fantastic. They gave us great insights and came back with suggestions for improvement. They were very instrumental in the prototyping – particularly with the format of the online correspondence and emails being received back. They are seeing huge benefits in getting the responses back quickly to their constituents. The constituents can be included in the acknowledgements and responses if the elected members wish (this varies across the county).
Savings made to Cork County Council, TDs and Councillors. (could be Good PR ☺)
Ideally, all councillors will engage with this system. If they don’t the facility will be available to all ‘housing staff’ to enter case onto system on the councillors behalf in any office.
The TDS we spoke with were very happy to correspond with us through email. Some may still post acknowledgement to constituent – that’s their choice.
During the process of the Community Grant project we ran learning lunches, inviting staff to see what we had been developing, teaching basic skills, delivered by our CST team. This was a very beneficial networking event to gain buy-in from housing department ahead of our potential work with the housing department.
We’ve won hearts and minds of a cross diagonal slice of the organisation and housing department who are now considering applying the Service Design approach to other areas including housing repairs