Risky Assumptions
Working on a digitally inclusive solution to provide information and advice to families who struggle with digital access.
Working on a digitally inclusive solution to provide information and advice to families who struggle with digital access felt like a challenge I wasn’t sure we’d overcome at the start of this project.
My assumption from the outset had been that people with limited digital access, or who were unconfident with digital tools, wouldn’t want more digital services. That proved to be my riskiest assumption (something the Catalyst programme has taught me all about!). The reality is, as our families told us, most people are comfortable with accessing information online. The issue is rarely that they don’t want digital services (Covid has shown us the importance of being able to offer everything virtually). It’s that digital services are often more complicated than they need to be.
When you work in a digital team, it’s very easy to get distracted by the latest tool, and assume that providing ‘best in class’ digital services actually means ‘newest, most talked about thing’. This is where digital exclusion really comes into play. If you’re only chasing after ‘new, innovative’ tools, you’re probably excluding people from using them. New often translates as ‘requires lots of data’, or a user experience that isn’t all that intuitive.
Our beneficiaries want digital services, and are comfortable using them, if they are designed with them in mind. They need to be simple, easy to use, and not require lots of data or the latest smartphone to operate them. The success of them will be judged on whether they help beneficiaries get the information they need. My riskiest assumption was that the answer wouldn’t be digital. Instead, we’ve built a chatbot that beneficiaries have been very comfortable using, and have found valuable in helping them to take action. This is not the solution we had envisaged at the start of this process, but by listening to our beneficiaries and challenging ourselves at every step of the way, has resulted in a tool that will hopefully enable us to support more families going forward.
