First up, I should start with a caveat:
Empathy as
a core feature
I don't work for the government any longer, but throughout this talk I'm likely to still say "we". A lot. Needless to say, this talk isn't a reflection of current government policy and I haven't been party to the GDS' plans since I left in August. YMMV.
Joshua Marshall @partiallyblind
Collaborate Nov 12 2014
This is quite an old quote from Sir Tim but I think it still bears repeating:
The power of the Web is in its universality.
Access by everyone regardless of ability is an essential aspect. Sir Tim Berners Lee
Inventor of the World Wide Web
The power of the Web is in its universality.
Access by everyone regardless of ability is an essential aspect. The web was designed to be democratic and open to anyone. Over time we've taken away that availability through our design decisions, but it’s our responsibility as makers on the web platform to make sure it lives up to that ideal.
The Government Digital Service is a fairly recently formed part of the UK Government, part of the Cabinet Office so it sits right at the heart of central govt. Set up to provide a dedicated in-house technology team that allows us to save money by being smart about buying and building digital services for government.
What is the GDS?
In 2010 Martha Lane-Fox in her role as UK’s Digital Champion was asked to report on the state of digital public services on the govt's official website at the time, and how they could be made more efficient and cost-effective. Establish the GDS
Fix publishing Fix transactions Go wholesale
Rather than just do that she looked far wider and produced a short, very readable report with four recommendations: set up in-house capability to work on digital services, fix publishing so it was done through one consistent, predictable platform, fix the most used transactions so they’re better and more consistent, then provide APIs for everything so others can build on the platform.
flickr.com/photos/paul_clarke/6476402581/
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/directgov-2010-and-beyond-revolutionnot-evolution-a-report-by-martha-lane-fox
I'm now a consultant for The Paciello Group but I spent three and half years helping to build the GDS as a developer, as a line-manager and later as Head of Accessibility for GDS.
Why am I telling you this?
Part developer/part a11y evangelist, but most importantly I was a civil servant… Not a contractor, full time member of HM Government, paid by the tax payer to think about and improve web accessibility across govt. Back in March 2011 I was a hired for a six week freelance project to help a small team finish building a prototype of Martha's idea of a single domain for government. We built the alpha prototype and launched it in the open, and that 12 week project led to the Minister for the Cabinet Office setting up the GDS so we could build what became this:
https://www.gov.uk
GOV.UK
Welcome to GOV.UK The best place to find government services and information Simpler, clearer, faster
Popular on GOV.UK
Universal Jobmatch job search Renew vehicle tax (tax disc) Log in to student finance Book your theory test
Search GOV.UK
Employment and Support Allowance
Services and information
This website replaces
Benefits
Disabled people
Housing and local services
Births, deaths, marriages and care
Driving and transport
Money and tax
Business and self-employed
Education and learning
Passports, travel and living abroad
Citizenship and living in the UK
Employing people
Visas and immigration
Crime, justice and the law
Environment and countryside
Working, jobs and pensions
Includes tax credits, eligibility and appeals
Parenting, civil partnerships, divorce and Lasting Power of Attorney
Tools and guidance for businesses
Voting, community participation, life in the UK, international projects
Legal processes, courts and the police
24
GOV.UK replaced direct.gov and Business Link as the online presence of HM govt, and since it’s been live it’s replaced the 24 separate ministerial department websites, sites for the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, and it's now home to over 200 of around 330 different organisations across government.
Includes carers, your rights, benefits and the Equality Act
Includes vehicle tax, MOT and driving licences
Includes student loans and admissions
Includes pay, contracts and hiring
Includes flooding, recycling and wildlife
Owning or renting and council services
As part of that transition, over 1800 different websites that government was running have been closed.
Includes debt and Self Assessment
Includes renewing passports and travel advice by country
Visas, asylum and sponsorship
Includes holidays and finding a job
We didn't want users to be lost just because we updated something, so we redirected the old content to a new URL if it’s still live, or to an archived version on the National Archives site so we’re not breaking the web while things are transitioned over to GOV.UK.
so with GOV.UK, we have Martha's consistent platform for publishing, with one consistent user experience.
https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/cabinet-office
GOV.UK Search
Departments Worldwide How government works Get involved Policies Publications Consultations Statistics Announcements
Efficiency and Reform Group Press office contacts
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Government ministers and responsibilities
No apps, built using responsive design so we don’t have to spend taxpayer money on a separate mobile site or iOS or Android version.
6 November 2014 — Press release
New Digital Marketplace opens for business Cabinet Office Minister Francis Maude launched the Marketplace, which makes it easier for government to do business with all IT providers.
No separate “accessible version”. No silos for anyone. Focus on accessibility throughout the whole platform, including the publishing tools that power it. We have just as much of a responsibility to the civil servants who have to use it to do their jobs as we do to the citizens who need to so they can live in society.
The content publishing part of their remit is pretty well established by now, but they’ve really only just started rebuilding the transactional services. There are almost 800 of them across gov., they're working on the busiest 25 to be relaunched by March 2015.
https://www.gov.uk/transformation
GOV.UK Home
Digital Transformation Government is building digital services that are simpler, clearer and faster to use. We’re starting with these 25 services. You can follow our progress on this page. Discovery
Alpha
Beta
0
3
15
User needs are researched A core service is built to The service is improved, and identified meet the main user needs then tested in public Learn more about the Learn more about the alpha Learn more about the beta discovery phase phase phase
Live
7 The service is public and works well. It’ll be continually improved to meet user needs Learn more about the live phase
Digital services so good people prefer to use them The Government Digital Strategy and departmental digital strategies commit us to the redesigning and rebuilding of 25 significant ‘exemplar’ services. We’re going to make them simpler, clearer and faster to use. All these are to meet the Digital By Default Service Standard by April 2014 and be completed by March 2015. This dashboard shows you which transactions are in the programme, what progress is
There are 7 live services currently, 15 in beta and 3 more in alpha. Lasting Power of Attorney, Student Finance, Online Electoral Registration, and very recently View Driving License, so there's some hugely important services in there with millions of users per year. By the time they’re done, all of the transactional services should be rebuilt and redesigned to behave consistently with GOV.UK so you should be able to do everything you need to across the whole of govt more clearly, and faster.
https://www.gov.uk/transformation
To give you some sense of the size of it:
Over GOV.UK’s first year
427m 1.2b visits
page views
In the first year it had 427m visits and 1.2b page views. That was approximately 1m visits per day. Highest was around 2m. During March this year it topped 51 million visits in a single month. It currently gets roughly 8m visitors every week. GOV.UK just celebrated the two year anniversary of being a live service...
with the milestone of a billion visits since launch.
1 BILLION visits to GOV.UK since launch
...that’s a lot of people to piss off if it’s not working right. As government moves more content publishing and services onto the platform it’s only getting busier.
If you’re talking about a service of that scale, how do you make it work for everyone. You’re talking 40-50 million people at least once a year having to interact with it.
How do you
make it work
for everyone?
The teams building these services are spread across different govt departments and external agencies. They're in different offices throughout the country. The have wildly diverse audiences, very different teams and operating environments. How do you get everyone travelling in the same direction? How do you try and not exclude anyone if you’re only providing one platform?
We started with a set of design principles. Starting with shared principles is good. Focus everyone on the same goals.
https://www.gov.uk/design-principles
GOV.UK ALPHA
Search
Last updated 2 July 2012
Government Digital Service
Design Principles Listed below are our design principles and examples of how we’ve used them so far. These build on, and add to, our original 7 digital principles. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Start with needs* Do less Design with data Do the hard work to make it simple Iterate. Then iterate again. Build for inclusion Understand context Build digital services, not websites Be consistent, not uniform Make things open: it makes things better
1 Start with needs*
For a11y, principles #4 and #6 are helpful but they all convey empathy for the person having to use the service... No-one wants to use these things, they're forced to. The least we can do is make it as simple as we can. Start with user needs, Do less, Do the hard work to make it simple, Build for inclusion... All these things, time and time again, come back to how to best serve the person using it rather than the needs of government.
The Design Principles then informed this: the Digital by Default Service Standard. https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/digital-by-default
GOV.UK
Government Service Design Manual
Search the service manual
Digital by Default Service Standard Start using the manual Feedback
Tell us what you think (opens a 3 minute survey on another website) Home
The government's digital strategy committed them to ensuring all new and redesigned digital services met this standard so we can be confident that they're as good as we can make them and fit for purpose. The principle behind the GDS' mission is to make digital services so good that people prefer to use them over other, much more expensive channels.
The Government Digital Strategy committed the government to ensuring all new or redesigned digital services meet this standard from April 2014. Services will be assessed against the standard and must continue to meet the standard after launch. Digital teams must show that they understand that their service needs to meet the standard and should understand what happens to failing services. Teams must meet the criteria below, and maintain this quality for the full life of their service.
https://www.gov.uk/service-manual
GOV.UK Search the service manual
Government Service Design Manual Digital by Default Service Standard Start using the manual Feedback
Tell us what you think (opens a 3 minute survey on another website)
The standard came into force in April this year. It’s not optional, you can’t choose whether you want to use it. If you’re building for govt, you follow and you're assessed against it. The 26 criteria are all based on parts of this:
As we were building GOV.UK, we took the things we learned along the way and turned that knowledge into the Service Design Manual: a collection of guidance for teams who want to build services like we built GOV.UK. Even if you’re not building for govt there’s some really good content in there.
From April 2014, digital services from the government must meet the new Digital by Default Service Standard. Read the standard »
Government Service Design Manual Build services so good that people prefer to use them Think differently about digital delivery Making a service Discover what it means to be part of an agile, userfocused and multidisciplinary team, delivering digital services in government. Start building digital by default services
Guides and resources for… Service managers
Learn about the different phases of service design and get guidance for the phase you're in now.
Discovery A short phase, in which you start researching the needs of your service’s users, find out what you should be measuring, and explore technological or policy-related constraints.
Learn about the discovery phase
https://www.gov.uk/service-manual
https://www.gov.uk/service-manual/user-centred-design/accessibility.html
GOV.UK
Government Service Design Manual Digital by Default Service Standard Start using the manual Feedback
Search the service manual
Tell us what you think (opens a 3 minute survey on another website) Home
User-centred design
Accessibility How to make services that everyone can use Contents Accessibility standard Accessibility testing Accessibility statements and policies Assistive technologies Accessible formats Accessible content Further reading
Accessibility and user centred design are a key part of what the GDS considers good service design.
The services we provide are for the benefit of all citizens of the United Kingdom. No user should be excluded on the basis of disability. To do so would breach the Equality Act 2010. Your services must also comply with any other legal requirements, including providing services in accordance with your Welsh Language Scheme, if you have one.
Your product has to be designed from the ground up to be usable by your entire audience, whatever their needs may be so there’s content around that. There's content about writing for the web, about creating accessible PDFs and open document formats, lots of technical stuff about service delivery and agile project management, content on user-centred design and user research...
Accessibility standard As a starting point, your service should aim to meet Level AA of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0.
Accessibility testing Your service should be tested by disabled people, older people, and people who use assistive technologies. You should aim to do this at least twice as your service is developed.
https://www.gov.uk/how-to-use-the-digital-services-store
GOV.UK Search
Departments Worldwide How government works Get involved Policies Publications Consultations Statistics Announcements
Guidance
How to use the Digital Services Store From: First published: Last updated: Part of:
Cabinet Office 14 November 2013 29 November 2013 Public services: improving efficiency and funding and Government efficiency, transparency and accountability
How to appoint people for digital projects and the application process to supply services through the Digital Services framework. Contents Overview Digital Services framework Apply to the Digital Services framework Supplier evaluation Using the Digital Services Store Managed service for buyers Agile methodology Services based on user need Security clearance Contact us
Overview The Digital Services Store is where central government, local authorities, devolved administrations, arm’s length bodies and wider public sector bodies can commission suppliers to work on digital projects via the Digital Services framework (DSf). Buyers can either contract with suppliers for individual roles to join their existing digital teams, or create entire digital teams to work on a project.
Digital Services framework This framework is an agreement with suppliers that sets out terms and conditions under which individuals or teams can be contracted for digital projects. Suppliers should be able to work in an agile way.
Alongside all this work, we also created new rules for procurement of services for government. There’s not much point in doing all of this work if you can just skirt around the new rules and hire some crappy multi-national stuffed with expensive consultants to re-do the same terrible work they got away with for years… The Service Standard, the new procurement rules, the statement of quality set out in the Service Manual - all these things produce a system with really strong foundations that helps make everything better by putting the user at the heart of it.
All of the work done by the GDS has to satisfy this basic question.
What’s the
user need?
To publish something, to design something, to develop it and put it in front of users, you have to be able to prove that there’s an actual need behind it. It shouldn’t be about ego or vanity: it’s about your users. When you think about the work you’re currently doing, can you tie it back to a user need? Are you considering how it will help them fulfil their own needs? Businesses have to justify their primary aim - usually to make money - but as UX practitioners can you help improve the lives of your audience while doing that?
At the GDS, all of their products start small. No lengthy requirements phase followed by years of development to deliver something that's now massively out of date.
Where does accessibility fit into the process?
They make a MVP, iterate it, then test it to back up their assumptions with data. Different expectations depending on alpha/beta/live product, but it’s not optional. It's got to be accessible by the time it's a live service or it will fail its service assessment. The earlier you introduce it into your processes, the easier it becomes. Their product teams are multi-disciplinary, so the writers are involved, the designers, the developers, the QA people, the product owners, and it's built in from the start of the discovery phase. Everyone is collectively responsible for it.
The prettiest, most technically brilliant site in the world won’t last if the foundations are lousy.
I’m not disabled. Why should I care?
Accessibility should be a quality issue. If you remotely give a shit about the work you’re putting out there, making it accessible should be a no-brainer for how professionals build products in 2014. We’ve moved on from spacer gifs and tables for layout and editing files live on the server because our tools and browsers have moved on and matured. The tools to help us make things accessible have too. Hands up who in this room identifies themselves as being disabled? Who looks the same as you did on the day you were born? We're all getting older. Disability isn't a fixed thing.
User experience, user-centred design, accessible UX, I think all these phrases boil down to the same idea: having empathy for your users.
Empathy as a core feature
The idea for the GDS is to build better digital public services by empathising with the needs of the users of those services rather than the needs of Govt. You shouldn’t have to understand the structure of govt to interact with it: you should be able to go to the website, find what you want and get it done and leave with the minimum of hassle or intrusion. Your users should be able to do the same, regardless of any access needs they may have, if you consider them from the outset while you design and develop your products.
If you need help in getting started, earlier this year Sarah Horton and Whitney Quesenbery published A Web For Everyone. It’s a terrific book which I’d highly recommend, and not just because Sarah is awesome and a colleague of mine at The Paciello Group. The personas in the book are really well thought out and do a great job of introducing good accessible product design if you’re new to it, and explaining the kinds of issues that you might not be aware of if you don't personally have much exposure to them. rosenfeldmedia.com/books/a-web-for-everyone/
http://rosenfeldmedia.com/books/a-web-for-everyone/
Not solely about empathy: it’s the law. Disability is a protected characteristic in the Equality Act, A11y forms Article 9 of the Declaration of Human Rights, so it’s your legal obligation to make reasonable adjustments for your disabled users.
Design like you give a damn
I don’t really care about the law. I care about our users. On GOV.UK I wasn't trying to make special exemptions for certain citizens, I was just trying to give the users who need to use assistive technologies for whatever reason equivalent access to the same information I have. "The disabled" aren't an unknown focus group. They our family, our friends, our colleagues, they're tax payers and they deserve the dignity that goes along with being able to live life independently because we did our jobs.
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Accessible design doesn’t have to mean sites like this. It’s not 2004 any more, the web’s grown up.
'It was the most unfortunate thing that can ever happen to a person': Teary Lily Allen talks about stillbirth of son four years ago On Jonathan Ross That's some photobomb! Taylor Swift makes dreams come true when she crashes young fans' portrait session during a jog True role model What a pair! Kim Kardashian bares her cleavage as she wears matching outfit with Kanye West on date night in NYC Double-date
We build things for users, to satisfy their needs. Accommodating those who may need us to make a bit more effort to include them is just good business.
This is one of the proudest moments of my working life so far. Last year GOV.UK won the grand prize in the Design Museum’s Design of the Year award. We beat some really, really amazing projects like the Olympic Cauldron, and the day after we won the Mail called us boring.com. They took the piss out of us for winning with our "basic-looking site" when theirs looks like this. Maybe if GOV.UK posted more news about Kim Kardashian's cleavage they'd like us more? The judges called it the Paul Smith of websites so I’d rather take that, to be honest. Going back to talking about building on strong foundations, the number one reason GOV.UK has been so successful is this:
Well written content is THE most important thing.
We stopped sounding like the government
Hire great writers if you don’t have them. Ones who understand how to write for the web. Microcopy, tone of voice, simple direct language: all contribute to better understanding for everyone. We ditched the government jargon, the legalese, the repetition, and we simplified our language. We deleted tens of thousands of pages of crappy content. We banned hundreds of words and phrases and retrained over a thousand writers. Making our content clear and understandable has made more of a difference to our accessibility and our usability than any code-based thing we could have done. By empathising with our users we saw that they didn't want to spend any more time on this than possible, so we cleared the way to make that happen in every way we could.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rooreynolds/9034182786/
As well as Design of the Year award, we also won D&AD yellow and black pencils for the quality of our writing. The D&AD awards are hugely prestigious design and advertising awards. Black pencils are rarely given to anyone. Apple’s design team were awarded one for 30 years of outstanding design. The UK government won one for the quality of it’s writing. Think about that for a sec.
this is the usual level of brilliance we expect from government writing.
Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Act 2014
You'll note they also had to publish a separate guide to understand the bill in the first place because the language they publish them in is so dense and arcane...
CHAPTER 27
Explanatory Notes have been produced to assist in the understanding of this Act and are available separately
£6.00
#AUX is becoming more established. We’re working together more as practitioners. The idea of building products in ways which encourage thinking about users of all abilities throughout the projects life.
Accessible UX
So using personas of users with varied abilities, Clear purpose and well-defined goals, Building to web standards using solid structure, Simplifying your interactions and UI, Providing helpful way-finding so your users don’t get lost, Plain language and accessible media It doesn’t matter whether you make online games or a government service: it all contributes to better, more flexible, more user friendly products
It’s not about what you do, but rather what you enable others to do.
Brad Frost (a web developer in the USA) spoke recently at a TEDx event and I really love this quote. It's not about what you do, it's about what you enable other people to do.
Brad Frost youtube.com/watch?v=7rW9vTrN6OU
It’s not about what you do, but rather what you enable others to do. Brad Frost youtube.com/watch?v=7rW9vTrN6OU
It’s not about you, it’s about what your processes, your company culture, what your product design decisions allow and empower your users to achieve.
https://twitter.com/dylanw/status/454746152915587072
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From my conversation with @wendyabc: UX and accessibility both have empathy as a core value. So why don't UX and #a11y work together more? Reply Retweet Favorite More RETWEETS
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UX and a11y both have empathy as a core value, so why don't they work together more? I’d argue it’s because too many companies are still thinking and working in role-based silos. A11y shouldn’t be something that one person on the team takes care of in isolation. It shouldn't be bolted on at the end if you get around to it. It’s everyone’s responsibility throughout.
3:21 PM - 11 Apr 2014
Patrick Neeman @usabilitycounts· Apr 11 @dylanw @wendyabc isn’t #a11y part of UX? Everything else is. ;) Details
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Andrew Woods @awoods· Apr 11 @dylanw @wendyabc #a11y is about users. If it's not part of what you do, you're not doing #UX - you're doing something else Details
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Dylan Wilbanks @dylanw· Apr 11 @usabilitycounts @wendyabc SURE WHY NOT I MEAN CHEESEMAKING IS A UX FIELD RIGHT Details
I don’t care about your job title, I care about how you’re going to contribute to making better products, for everyone. About how you’ll demonstrate empathy for those users who may need a little more help.
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anne gibson @kirabug· Apr 11 @dylanw @wendyabc because the vast majority of accessibility coverage is done in the code, not the design?
As Head of A11y it was my responsibility that our stuff worked, but every product owner is responsible for their own applications. I was just there to support them.
Regardless of your current role, we’re all able to take a lead in improving the UX of our products in some way.
What extra can you do to help someone?
Whether by designing the perfect submit button, by making your content easier to understand, or by focussing on performance related problems, we can all contribute to making things better. Choosing to focus on making them more accessible as well opens up your potential audience to groups with huge spending power. A relatively small investment in time and effort can give you huge rewards. They can differentiate between you and your competition. I advocate for users and for accessibility because I think it’s the right thing to do, but I also really like getting paid.
I don’t usually include videos in my talks but forgive me for this one. It's pretty short. Don’t let the fact that it’s a Microsoft promo put you off. Video: youtube.com/watch?v=JObFlEvc-Eg Here you have a former professional football player in the USA with ALS - motor neurone disease - who now lives his entire life through software and hardware. The motorised wheelchair and breathing apparatus give him freedom of movement. youtube.com/watch?v=JObFlEvc-Eg
Eye tracking software on his tablet allows him to live a life he’d simply be unable to live without someone having the empathy to ensure that it was accessible and usable in that way. The products we make have users just like Steve. Or they could...
What can you do when you go back to work to improve your products for your users? What impact can you make if you just change one thing?
So, I’ll leave you with a challenge
Make your product work better for a screen reader user, fix your colour contrast so it’s more usable for those with visual problems. Make it work for keyboard only users. Lots of things we do for accessibility don’t need you to change your designs. They won’t be noticed by most users, but for those who rely on those fixes being in place? Sounds like hyperbole, but you’ve just actively contributed to improving the quality of their lives. Who doesn’t want that for their users?
The power of the Web is in its universality.
Access by everyone regardless of ability is an essential aspect. Sir Tim Berners Lee
Inventor of the World Wide Web
don’t assume that because you’re making a camera app that your blind customers won’t use it. don’t assume that because you’re making a game, users with cerebral palsy won't use switches to play it. don’t assume that because you’re publishing erotic Harry Potter fan-fiction that you won’t have disabled fans enjoying it too. We can do amazing things on the web so long as we remember to provide that access to all of our users. Focussing on simplicity, usability, accessible user experience; makes everything better, for all of your users. How will you help push the web forward, for everyone?
Thanks.
Joshua Marshall @partiallyblind
