A Senior Citizen Engagement Service Design and Prototype
A Collaborative Project for BMC-377- Design Thinking
BY: C.H, J.C, M.G, R.L
For our collaborative assignment, our group decided to investigate the issue of senior citizens feeling isolated from the broader community. This is a well-documented concern, particularly in Western societies where individuals often live alone and less emphasis is put on communal needs. Our problem statement was that “Senior citizens don’t have enough opportunities to integrate into the community.”
1. IDENTIFY THE PROBLEM
From there, we used the “What’s Your Problem” worksheet to better understand the situation, various individuals and groups that might be involved, and the environment (Appendix 1). We recognized that senior citizens may not have as many opportunities as they would like to integrate with their community, but that in solving the issue we would need to also consider their needs as well as those of the other community members we would want to engage with them.
As we discussed the issue, it also became clear that there are many people, groups, and organizations who are involved or impacted by this problem and that a solution would have to consider the needs and interests of all of them in order to be successful. For the purposes of the assignment, we decided to limit ourselves to two key user groups (more on that in section 2), however, more consideration would have to be given to the other stakeholders if a solution were to be implemented.
And finally, for the purposes of the assignment, we decided to focus on the City of Calgary as our environment, even though this is an issue that affects senior citizens across North America and around the world.
Next, we filled out “Reframe Your Problem” worksheets to reconsider the problem as an opportunity. We came up with lots of potentials “How Might We” statements to help us really understand what we are trying to achieve (Appendix 2).
2. HUMAN-CENTERED DESIGN
Once we had a better understanding of what our goals were, we shifted our attention to our users. While many groups would ultimately need to be involved in our solution for seniors, we chose to focus on our two key user groups for this assignment — the senior citizens who would like to be more involved in the community, and the community members we would like to connect with them.
We dug into three key research areas to help us understand these audiences better. First, we looked at what the needs and considerations are for seniors who don’t feel like they are integrated enough in the community. Then we looked at what programs currently exist that are seeking to solve this problem and what is already being tried. And then, finally, we looked at what the potential barriers might be to why younger community members (defined in this case as anyone 18–65) don’t spend more time interacting with seniors.
Our research told us that the Canadian population is aging. As of 2013, seniors (over 65 years) are currently 15% of the total population and by 2038 they are expected to make up 40%. They have many skills to offer even after they are out of the workforce and often contribute much within their households and communities as childcare providers, housekeeping and cooking help, and volunteers. Seniors continue to seek improvement and work on the best version of themselves. They must fulfill their socialization, spiritual, emotional, psychological, physical and entertainment needs, just like anyone else.
However, 30% of seniors are at risk of becoming socially isolated. According to The National Seniors Council, social isolation of seniors can lead to a lack of unity within communities, which in turn leads to higher social costs and a loss of experience/wisdom. 92.1 % of seniors live in private households, and barriers they encounter include lack of transportation, physical disability, health, loss of a spouse, income, discrimination, language and accessibility to programs and services.
Further issues are faced by immigrant seniors who face barriers of language and culture. Approximately 19% of the immigrant population in Canada is over 65, and “the immigrant population is older on average than the Canadian population.” Between 2012–2016, 63% of immigrant seniors do not speak either of the official languages English or French.
There are numerous organizations across Calgary (and Alberta) that offer services for seniors, including housing, counseling, integration, abuse intervention, recreation, training, and more (Appendix 3). And, organizations such as seniors’ clubs, community organizations, and specialty groups exist that aim to address the issue of isolation among seniors.
However, many seniors report feeling isolated and marginalized from the community. In spite of the existence of these support programs, their level of integration and interconnectedness in the community is low.
So why is that? Research into the “generational divide” between younger and older people revealed several common themes.
The first is that younger people do not have many natural occasions for interaction with senior citizens in today’s society. This is attributed to several causes, including the movement of younger generations into cities (and thus away from multi-generational families), the changing nature of work since industrialization (meaning older people aren’t in contact with younger people once they stop working in offices or factories), and differences in the way young and old people spend their time (leading to a lack of shared activities).
Additionally, ageist views on both sides of the divide create a lack of respect and common ground. Older generations view younger people as useless and entitled (and have since the beginning of time) while younger people view old folks as judgemental and out of touch. Social, political, and behavioral differences exacerbate the divide, leading many younger people to have negative views of the elderly.
Finally, while much literature exists on the concrete benefits to senior citizens from interacting with younger people, it was difficult to find information on immediate and tangible benefits to younger generations from spending time with seniors (many articles talked about “learning to respect older people” or “gaining the wisdom of older people”, which are in fact mainly benefits to older people). This supports a perception among younger people that there is not much for them to gain from engaging with senior citizens. Thus, one of our challenges is how to create social engagements that meet the needs of both seniors and the younger people we want to interact with them.
Based on our research, we developed empathy maps for each user — one for senior citizens and one for younger people — to help us understand how each is experiencing the problem (Appendix 4).
3. IDEATION
Armed with a better understanding of the wants, needs, concerns, and experiences of our users, we held a brainstorming session to develop possible ideas to help solve the problem and answer our “How Might We” questions. We relied on examples from the course videos and readings to guide us, and implemented guidelines such as trying to keep ideas to one sentence, “quantity over quality”, and “yes, and” to help us come up with as many ideas as we could. We ended up with 22 different possibilities to explore (Appendix 5).
From there, we narrowed it down to our favorite five ideas to prototype. Those ideas were:
· Peer-to-peer matching ex: learning or doing something in common
· Career/skills coaching for people looking to change jobs or learn a new career
· Cash incentive to include seniors in an event ex: on the planning board or organizing committee
· Senior teaching a class ex: pierogi or dumpling making class
· Younger people can earn “points” for helping or doing activities with seniors, that can be redeemed for coupons or prizes
4. PROTOTYPING
Finally, for our prototyping phase, we got together to quickly develop potential user flows for each idea. Because we were looking at services instead of products, we chose to sketch out what the user experience would look like for each idea (Appendix 6). For each, we considered what the necessary steps and components would look like for seniors and younger people to use the service, how to make it interesting and accessible to each group, and how it would help fulfill our goal of helping seniors integrate with others in the community.
Based on our prototypes, we felt our best idea is to develop a points program, similar to the Student Price Card, that would allow younger people to gain points for doing activities with seniors, such as helping a senior with their groceries or going for a walk with them, that could then be redeemed at local businesses for discounts on products and services. We felt that this option would be relatively easy for both young people and seniors to participate in, would help provide an incentive for younger people to spend time with seniors, and would involve the broader community in the effort because local companies could get involved.
To implement this idea, our next step would be to run some inexpensive surveys on social media and at seniors’ and community centers in order to gauge interest in the program among our target users. We would ask questions about whether they would be interested in the program as well as things like what sort of products and services they would like to be able to receive (young people), what sort of activities they would like to do (seniors), and questions about the actual service experience, such as how points could best be given and received and how people would want to sign up for the service. These research questions would help us to fine-tune the idea and make sure we had user interest before we tried to actually test the program.
Once we had refined the concept, we would choose a test market such as one particular neighborhood to roll out the idea. We would choose a neighborhood with a strong existing seniors program that we could hopefully partner with to implement the program, as well as one with a large number of businesses that we would approach to participate by accepting the points. We would promote the program launch through the local community/seniors’ center as well as in the neighborhood newsletter and social media to get participants on board.
In our research, we discovered that seniors are a diverse community, and this community lacks engagement in many areas. People are living longer, and healthier lives, and retirement is simply another step in life. Seniors will eventually be 40% of the population and there are multiple generations within this population with various skills and experiences. We remind those preparing and executing any of these projects to allow flexibility in their prototypes by utilizing the empathy maps, as we have focused on service, more than the physical product.
APPENDIX 1 — WHAT’S YOUR PROBLEM
APPENDIX 2 — REFRAME YOUR PROBLEM
APPENDIX 3 — EXISTING SENIORS’ PROGRAMS
APPENDIX 4 — EMPATHY MAPS
Seniors
Young People
APPENDIX 5 — IDEATION
Senior citizens don’t have enough opportunities to integrate into the community.
- Win-win option — sharing services (ex: babysitting, teaching, chores, cooking)
- Peer-to-peer matching ex: learning something in common
- Volunteer options for both groups so they can work together
- Exercise or outdoor activities
- Afternoon tea — sharing stories or memories
- Museum or other tours
- Create a position in government for someone to organize these activities
- Career or skills sharing — ex: senior engineer matched with a young engineer or student
- Online “speed networking” or other digital events
- Project/career fairs — younger people share ideas, older people can collaborate and share experience
- Career/skills coaching for people looking to change jobs or learn a new career
- Newcomer matching for younger newcomers to Canada — matched with seniors in their community or job
- Cash incentive to include seniors in an event ex: on the planning board or organizing committee
- Seniors assisting in schools or community centers — could be paid placement
- “Showcase seniors” ex: senior comes into school to give talks, is around all week for discussions
- “Big Brothers and Big Sisters” for seniors
- Senior teaching a class ex: pierogi or dumpling making class
- Cultural events ex: Slava or Lunar New Year — seniors could give history, stories
- Seniors teach lessons ex: driving lessons
- “Block watch” or community watch groups
- Community night where teenagers can teach skills like technology
- Younger people can earn “points” for helping or doing activities with seniors, that can be redeemed for coupons or prizes
APPENDIX 6 — PROTOTYPING
· Younger people can earn “points” for helping or doing activities with seniors, that can be redeemed for coupons or prizes
· Peer-to-peer matching ex: learning or doing something in common
· Career/skills coaching for people looking to change jobs or learn a new career
· Cash incentive to include seniors in an event ex: on the planning board or organizing committee
· Senior teaching a class ex: pierogi or dumpling making class
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