Design for Public Administration
This study focuses on the issue of access to Italian public services, and the goal of the research is to propose a solution that would ensure all citizens have an equally positive experience when trying to access government services, however they decide to access them.
Background
In 2020 Europe entered its Digital Decade, during which time the European Commission aims to increase the digitalization of processes and services, and put a strong emphasis on data, technology and infrastructure. Focusing on public service, the European Union goal is to have the major public services 100% online, to ensure access to electronic health records for all citizens, and to have at least 80% of the population using digital ID by 2030. The EU is working to help public administrations across Europe to make the change to digital so all citizens can enjoy the benefits of smart public services.
In Italy, to date, the range of digital services provided by PAs is still uneven and fragmented, in fact only 36% of Italian citizens actively use e-Gov services, compared to the European average of 64%; and this is due to the complexity and the poor quality user experiences which italian digital services offer.
Designers Italia
This is why in 2021 the Italian Department for Digital Transformation has allocated 400 million euros to improve the online services provided by Italian municipalities. Over the past year, Designers Italia, the public administration design department, which I had the opportunity to collaborate with during my internship, did a huge work to reach the standards for digitalization required by the EU.
In fact, we did a deep analysis of the more than 200 public administration services, which are currently provided mainly at the regional level, and grouped them into 5 service archetypes that represent the main interactions that citizens have with the municipality. A standardized service flow was then created for each archetype, composed of elements, called blocks, that are intuitive and easy to navigate; the 5 flows created then provide a common guide for all Italian municipalities to develop nationally standardized and more accessible digital public services.
Problem definition
These new digital processes will have for sure a significant impact, however, digital technology access and skill levels continue to remain unequal, which implies that a large portion of the population cannot even use these tools. Designers, working in the public sector, have often focused on creating experiences that work for the average person, at the expense of people that need something diverse, but designing for the public has to produce solutions that can be utilized and experienced by all.
In Italy the population is still very dishomogeneous when it comes to access to technology and digital skills. These Istat data show that there is still a significant portion of the population in Italy that can’t access online services, because they don’t own digital devices or don’t have enough skills. While digitization continues and digital services are continually being improved; services provided at physical counters have never been renewed, failing to ensure a quality experience for those who need to use these physical channels.
After identifying the main barriers citizens encounter using digital public services I searched for opportunities of redesign. The main goal of this study is to improve the quality of public services for all the citizens and in the meantime also consider the direction the EU is prioritizing, that is digital by default. In Italy, digital services have just been redesigned and should therefore ensure a better quality. These online processes could be really beneficial for the population, however we know that access to digital services is not yet possible for all citizens so we should ask ourselves, how may we increase the number of citizens who use digital services without excluding the ones who can’t?
To answer this question I identified two main opportunities: first it’s important to increase as much as possible the number of citizens who use online public services. Italy has already developed some digital training programs to reduce the digital gap and aims to have 80% of the population proficient in basic digital skills by 2030, however a more effective solution in the short time is needed. Therefore I decided to focus my attention on the current support system that the municipalities offer and I tried to understand how to improve so that it can better support citizens to complete their processes online.
Secondly, I also considered that 21% of households do not have access to the Internet at home, and some citizens, even with the help of an operator, would anyway struggle to complete an online application. To guarantee a quality experience also to this portion of the population we should grant them easy access to municipalities offices, without them having to wait long times in line, knowing what to bring with them and having a smooth journey. Allowing them to easily book an appointment should improve the experience at the physical counter and guarantee a better and more organized process.
These two features are clearly not new, citizens could already call the support phone number of the municipalities and they could send an email to book an appointment. However Istat data from 2020 shows that 60% of the respondents found it difficult to speak with an operator and 41.7% of them encountered barriers to book an appointment. In the last year, to address these issues, Designers Italia digitalized these two processes, and transformed them into 2 quick online forms that should improve both citizens and operators' experience. However this project focuses on citizens with limited digital skills and who do not have access to digital devices or internet connection; the digitalization of these two services clearly won’t change anything for them.
Solution
To maintain all the benefits that digitization has brought to these two processes while also making them more widely available to all citizens, a substitute approach is needed. Therefore I thought of using digital signage, which refers to display technology like interactive kiosks solutions or digital totems, which can be placed anywhere and can be used by everyone. This technology could allow all the citizens to have access to a digital tool, and furthermore could develop the two features of asking for assistance and booking an appointment with the municipality, proposing few steps and simple interfaces; also the most digitally vulnerable individuals would be facilitated to use it. Public administration could also benefit from this technology, as it would enable most citizens to plan access to physical counters and schedule almost all assistance requests.
Prototype
Starting from the analysis of the two digital features developed with Designers Italia I created an interactive prototype adapting every step to the needs of citizens who prefer to use totems. Clearly, not all the functionalities proposed on the Designers Italia models were suitable for a totem located in a public place and accessible to all citizens, so some proposals were revised and adapted to the context. I paid particular attention to privacy policies and I introduced some non-digital elements like a paper receipt to make the process smoother also for the most digital poor citizens.
Afterwards, I decided to validate this idea and I developed a research plan to identify what I wanted to investigate and which tools I needed to do so. The main question was to understand the effectiveness of this technology on digitally poor citizens. I therefore developed a functioning prototype which was instrumental in conducting guerrilla user testing, during which participants were asked to complete a task. The prototype is shown on an ipad, as it is the closest screen that the actual interactive totem might have and presents two possible user flows: booking an appointment and booking an assistance call with an operator, both for a specific service.
Then I decided also to investigate some of the habits of the respondents, for example how often they go to the municipalities offices, if they are comfortable using online services and also which public places they go to the most. All of these questions were asked using a paper form, as I wanted the interactive prototype to be the only digital tool during the interviews.
User test results
I then conducted these tests at the City Hall 6 in Milan, after asking for permission, where I interviewed 10 citizens who were waiting in the waiting room to renew their ID, change their residence and so on. The results obtained were mostly positive:
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All the respondents completed the task successfully and most of them valued the idea of creating these interactive totems.
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I received some very interesting suggestions about elements that could be implemented or modified on the totem which could clearly be added in a reviewed version of it.
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In general, almost all the respondents have encountered barriers before in asking for assistance or booking an appointment, in fact only 3 out of 10 of them were there with an appointment, therefore they found that this solution could really improve their experience.
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I investigated in which locations they would like to have these totems, so that they are easy to access and all of them agreed on supermarkets and some other interesting places were also proposed.
Limitations and next steps
To conclude, this study clearly presents some limitations: the sample size was very small as I interviewed only 10 citizens and furthermore the sample profile was very limited because I interviewed only residents of Milan, and I would probably obtain different results, especially in the questionnaire, if the city had a smaller dimension. Time constraint was also a limitation, it would have been good to implement the findings of the first round of tests and do a second round of interview in a different context.
It’s finally important to consider when this project was developed, the new Designers Italia templates were not yet implemented (as of now), so in the next months after their implementation is fundamental to understand how citizens experience will change, there were a huge work behind those templates and they’ll for sure bring some benefits. Therefore it’s fundamental to understand if some of the current issues will be solved and if some others will need to be addressed.
To take this project forward, I would like to create a fully functioning interactive totem model, not just a prototype, and place it at the entrance of some municipal offices for a few months so that I can then analyze analytics and collect more detailed data. I would also like to share this project, clearly with open copyright being a project dedicated to all citizens, to Designers Italy as a proposal to make Italian public services more inclusive and accessible.
This study presents a first step toward a solution that will be continually evolving in the coming years to ensure the inclusion of all citizens in public services.
Project overview
Professional Project: Fifth Beat, Designers Italia
Academic Project: Politecnico di Milano - Master degree thesis
Duration: 1 year
Design Team: Nina Zanarelli, Fifth Beat design team