Homelessness prevention: Our digital journey begins
Our Homelessness Prevention Centre is a drop in service that handles a large number of visits from people with a wide range of needs. Demand is expected to increase in the future, but with only a limited appointment management system and no way of predicting daily visitors, there is work to be done so we can continue to support our most vulnerable residents in the future.
So when it came to choosing a service to begin our digital journey, homelessness prevention was an obvious choice. Starting with a 6 week discovery phase, we immersed ourselves into the service at the centre in East Ham to really understand the issues and how digital could help.
Exploring the problem
Through user research and one-to-one interviews with staff and service users we gathered a range of insights about the day-to-day problems being faced by residents. Hearing first hand the struggles they go through and the needs of the staff that work with them, we could start to design a service that could help them.
We soon came to realise that we don’t know anything about our residents before they come into the centre. Because we don’t have the software to capture that data, anyone who goes online to get help is directed to our Homelessness Prevention Centre, regardless of their situation.
This got us thinking. With better advice and guidance online, users will be better informed around their specific situations, have a clearer idea of their rights and have a better indication of the timescales before they may have to leave their homes. If we can understand a resident’s situation before their appointment we can make the process shorter, more helpful and stop unnecessary visits to the centre.
Moving into development..
Our heads full of ideas we started to put pen to paper. From rough sketches, to paper models, to further designed paper models, to online prototypes, we began to visualise what the service could look like.
Pulling initial ideas together, such as online appointment forms, process timelines and email/SMS notifications we soon had an increasingly functional prototype that we could test with residents and staff and make changes based on their feedback.
..And beyond!
We are now starting to build our digital product. But that doesn’t mean we stop testing with our users and making improvements. They go hand in hand. Our service users keep us on track so our product continues to meet their needs whether it is an idea or a developed piece of software.
We are not just thinking about online. The offline experience, including the interaction between our residents and staff at the Homelessness Prevention Centre is a key part of our design. Find out more in our ‘Scissor, paper and a rock solid answer’ blog.
