Introducing the Digital and Innovation Team: Katie Dickerson, service designer
Katie tells us about being a service designer at RNID, why she loves a good map and what her service design superpower is
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Tell us about your role at RNID
I design services to help people complete their goals by finding out what users need and looking at the people, processes and systems involved.
How do we work effectively with a service designer?
Service designers ask ‘why?’ a lot, so be prepared for a lot of questions! We’re just trying to figure out what problem we’re trying to solve and how we’ll know if we fixed it.
Even though we’re part of the Digital and Innovation team, we aren’t just interested in the digital side of services. We want to know how the service works across all channels, including phone, paper and face-to-face.
We love a good map, and we’ll need you to help us understand how a service works so we can map it out. The process of mapping — having discussions, seeing where things fit, identifying opportunities — is more important than the map itself.
What are you working on at the moment?
I recently visited some of the pilot locations for our new face-to-face service to do some user research. After spending so many months designing the service remotely, it was great to see how the service runs and talk to people in person.
I’m also supporting the behaviour change campaign to encourage more people to get their hearing checked, and helping create a list of services that RNID provides so we can identify common patterns, systems and products that support them.
Tell us about something you’ve been proud to work on
I worked on a volunteer project with a charity that supports rape survivors to help make their web content easier for people to find and access. It was really rewarding to help people in crisis find the support that they need.
What’s your superpower as a service designer?
Being able look at how a service works from end-to-end, zooming out to get the big picture and zooming in to understand the details.
Where are you working today?
I’m working from the desk in my spare room in my Glasgow flat.
What’s your favourite weekend activity?
Going on day trips around Scotland with my husband and 2 young kids.
