Case study: Portuguese Immigration Process

Laetitia Legrand
Nov 3 · 6 min read
Post-it wall picture
Post-it wall picture

This article summarizes the first team project we had to do as UX/UI designers junior at Ironhack Lisbon (batch 3) during the 1st week.

Our target was immigrants in Portugal. We had to find the main pain-point immigrants can face while trying to get there paper done by the Portuguese immigration service (SEF -Serviço de Estrangeiros e Fronteiras) and offer a NON-DIGITAL solution to decrease it.

Different topics of intervention regarding the already existing information services such as accessibility and quality have been examined.

The problem statement of this project is:

How Might We help immigrants to find the information, complete the tasks and successfully get their paperwork done to start their life in a new city.

We were a team of five persons (Ale Berumen, Bárbara Francisco, Monique Araújo, Spencer Castiotos, Laetitia Legrand) to conduct this project.

For this project, we have used the 5 major phases of the Design Thinking approach.

Graph of the 5 step process
Graph of the 5 step process

1.EMPATHIZE

Insights about subject and users, observations

Every projects start with assumptions

First, we had to get to know our users to understand the pain points they face during this process and find the main one. As two persons of our team have been through this process we already got some insights, that was precious to understand the process but “we are not the user”, so we start to look for insights from users.

Qualitative data

We prepared interview questions and went in front of the SEF building to meet immigrants. We created open-ended questions and follow-up questions for the few ending questions left.

As it could be a sensitive subject for some people, we had to work on our approach while asking immigrants if they could give us some time and answer our questions. Another point we had to be cautious about was the language limitation. The immigrants we have met probably had more to say than speaking in their non-native language allowed them to do.

Fifteen face to face surveys have been conducted by our team at this point.

The qualitative results of this survey led to the conclusion that finding reliable information was the main pain point despite the existing website. Severals points were mentioned.

The process is not clear.

We miss human contact.

I had felt uncertain and anxious until the last point of the process.

Quantitative data

We prepared a survey based on valuable information found in our interviews and desk research. We used a lean survey canvas to help us decide on what we need to know. To confront this result to a bigger number we had created a Google form which we had more than 80 answers in 3 days. This quantitative data confirmed we needed to focus on finding the information, the need of human contact was present as well.

The problem is too much information don’t fit your case

Persona

The analyze of the quantitative data from the result of the Google form survey allowed us to define more clearly our persona (woman, 25-35, looking for join relative): Helena.

Helena, persona intro picture
Helena, persona intro picture

Affinity map & user journey

To get to know more Helena, we used tools and mapping techniques such as affinity diagrams and user journeys. It allowed us to get more insights about her, and bring her to life.

User journey picture
User journey picture

2.DEFINE

HMW (How Might We?)

Focused on that empathy work, from users we have met, to our data’s results and Helena’s view, the team conducted HMW sessions until we found which pain point was the main one to prioritize on this one.

The final problem statement was:

How might we help Helena to get information more easily?

3.IDEATE

Ideas & hypothesis statement

From the last HMW, the team started to exchange ideas and conduct Round-Robins sessions to pop-up some unexpected ideas.

We kept 3 mains ideas and tried to mix some of it elements. We get closer and more specific and were ready to prototype these 3 ideas to submit it to our target.

We created 3 hypothesis statements for our goal “find easily information regarding immigration process in Portugal”.

Usually, the user should get the process done at the first appointment (a second appointment should be made only if other documents are necessary due to the misunderstanding or confusion of the provided information).

We believe [improve the existing phone service by adding 24h service and extended the number of available languages with the possibility of reach a “real” human] for [immigrants in Portugal] will achieve [to help to access more easily to information]. We will know we are [right] with [the decreasing number of second appointment per person].

We believe [creating seminar information day at the SEF] for [immigrants in Portugal] will achieve [to help to access more easily to information]. We will know we are [right] with [qualitative feedabck] from another survey.

We believe [creating info point around the city] for [immigrants in Portugal] will achieve [to help to access more easily to information]. We will know we are [wrong] with [quantitative feedback] from another survey.

4.Prototype

Ideas representations

Based on the 3 hypothesis statement, we created a paper prototype to represent these 3 ideas. We went to meet the users in the street and ask them which solution seems to fit their needs the best.

We split into two small teams: one team was focused on English speaking users while the other one, on Portuguese and Spanish speaking users. When we met again, we get some issues: the number of the vote was strictly equal for each solution so we continue our face-to-face user test.

The user’s preferences were not the same depending on their life and status if some users liked the idea of following the SEF seminar, for some others, it seems to be more problematic regarding their schedule and sometimes go to the SEF seem to make them feel anxious or uncomfortable.

Finally, the largest amount of users we had met decided to choose the phone line. The service already exist but it needs to be improved by:

  • Multiple language native agents (human)
  • Extension of working hours (24h, every day)

Conclusion

“Trust the process”

Having been through the process of the 5 major phases of the Design Thinking approach we experimented the efficiency of this process. Sometimes, I had felt “what are we going to do now? And next? In which direction should we focus?” but following the process was just the right way to do. Even if the answer or direction didn’t come right away, each step of the process was leading us in a good direction for our final goal.

As a team, we were complementary in our intervention, style, knowledges, and approaches. We have thought as well as further steps that could be done to decrease other pain points and might fit some special situation.

During face-to-face user interview in the street, we didn’t exchange only informations and time but warm smile, it was real human experience where users had stay from the beginning to the end the center of each of our thoughts and actions.

Don’t hesitate to comment, thanks for reading!

Laetitia Legrand

Written by

Interest + Ux/UI/IxD = Bootcamp ^^

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