In today's digital age, governments around the world are increasingly relying on digital platforms for their daily operations, to deliver services and to provide resources to the people. These platforms play a critical role in improving agencies’ performance and efficiency, and shape residents’ engagement with government institutions. In this blog post, we discuss the importance of designing public sector-specific user experiences and interfaces (UX/UI), and explore how at GLASS we embrace this philosophy by strengthening our products with design.
Jason Moccia, founder of OneSpring, said “design is often perceived as something you do to make things look better; therefore, many project teams struggle to integrate design and understand its value.” This struggle is even more prevalent in governments, where the focus is often on delivering services and providing resources efficiently and effectively, leading to prioritizing function over form. Additionally, government agencies are often highly bureaucratic and hierarchical, which can make it challenging to adopt innovative design approaches that require collaboration and taking risks. As a result, there can be resistance to invest in design and understand its potential value in improving government performance and people’s engagement.
However, with the increasing adoption of digital platforms in government operations, there is a growing recognition that investing in UX/UI design is critical for delivering effective and efficient services to people and improving performance.
The vast majority of government activities are carried out through digital platforms and tools. Therefore, governments need to invest not only in designing and developing platforms for people to use, but also in digital solutions that enable public functions to be performed more transparently, efficiently, and innovatively. They can either acquire them from the private sector or develop them in-house using their own resources.
We strongly believe that governments require platforms that go beyond serving as a mere daily tool or a simple solution for moving from point A to point B. Our belief is that these platforms should offer a distinctive experience while also serving as a valuable complementary resource for government’s tasks. They should facilitate their work and provide a cutting-edge experience that enhances overall performance.
This is precisely why we have taken the initiative to refine our branding, not just once or twice, but now for the third time. We are unapologetic about this because we take pride in our commitment to evolve. Our work with governments constantly challenges us to innovate and reinvent ourselves. We understand that seeking comfort zones can hinder growth, so instead, we embrace disagreement as an opportunity to foster creativity and innovation.
The heart of our mission is not the software per se, but rather the experience that our users have when engaging with our products. We are committed to constantly enhancing our government partners' experience, and to that end, we have once again reinvented ourselves, committed to a product-centric approach.
A product-centric approach is a strategy that places a strong emphasis on the development and optimization of products and services that meet the needs of our customers. It involves a shift away from a company-centric approach to one that prioritizes our customers and their experience with our product. When it comes to governments, a product-centric approach involves creating tools that prioritize the government user experience and are tailored to meet the specific needs of the people and the agencies.
Isabel Torrón, GLASS’ Head of UX/UI Design, has been leading our latest brand refinement.
She considers that the top three elements to keep in mind when designing a government-specific platform are users, trustworthiness, and intuitiveness. Our users, because “they are at the center of any decision taken towards the development of our platforms and their needs guide our products’ evolution.” Trustworthiness, considering that “governments play a crucial role in the efficiency of the communities around them” so “we make sure that our platforms are trustworthy in terms of security, privacy and protection so that our government users only have to worry about performing their tasks without any additional concerns.” And, intuitiveness, as “we want to make sure we contribute to the efficiency in which governments are able to carry out their responsibilities”, therefore “our platforms are designed making sure the user can understand how to carry out the designated task with little to no extra training or guidance.”
We asked Isabel about the importance of focus when creating an outstanding user experience for governments. “Having a functional platform and one with a good user experience are not mutually exclusive characteristics. It is in GLASS’s DNA to maintain an intersection between these two highly-important conditions. We are inspired and guided by the belief that creating the best user experience for our government users, is ultimately the solution that will improve the quality and efficiency of the tasks they have at hand. By improving such output, they are able to produce a higher impact towards the communities that depend on them,” she said.
She pointed out that governments “can always count on GLASS to implement the most relevant and efficient solutions towards the pain points they might encounter in their tasks. We are constantly evaluating upcoming technologies and understanding their secure integration toward our product design. Tangible features that our users can benefit from within our products include time-saving search engines, automated purchasing quote turnover and highly responsive assistance 24/7 if needed. We are always available for our user’s feedback and feature requests in order to improve our solutions.”
By shifting towards a product-centric approach, we aim to continue reinventing ourselves, focusing on creating powerful tools that prioritize the user experience and are tailored to meet the specific needs of our government clients and partners.
Today, we are refining ourselves once again. Our appearance may have changed, but our vision remains the same. You can see our updated look on all of our platforms. Stay tuned for future updates!
This blog was written by Gisela Montes, GovTech Community Lead at Glass.