Making digital services more accessible for all — Part 4
The final part of this series illustrates how we continue to identify new user pain points and design opportunities through face-to-face research. If you are looking for Part 3, you can read it here.
Shaping a new relationship between citizens and digital government
SingPass Mobile is the tip of the iceberg in our vision to make digital services more accessible and inclusive for all. We want everyone to feel welcomed and supported, regardless of their current digital abilities. This is a huge challenge, but we strongly believe that user-centred design methods and approaches can help show us the way.
Through continuous design research, we can better understand how people from all walks of life interact with technology and government services, and from that understanding, create better digital experiences. Beyond building new features, we want to improve the experience of using government digital services past ‘good enough’ to be truly reassuring and trust-building.
To this end, it’s important that we not only have an idea of our users as data and numbers, but also as human beings with real pains and stories.
Recruiting for diverse research
More is not always better in design research. We face a trade-off between the total number of participants recruited, and the time spent interacting with and understanding each person. Instead of mass surveys or focus groups, we prioritise engaging each participant in a face-to-face interaction. This creates a safe space for their stories and emotions, allowing for richer insights from the individual.
How do you understand your users when they span an entire population of 5 million people? Unlike a commercial product, we don’t prioritise users solely by profit motive or their readiness for a product. Our aim is to cater to as much diversity as possible, and design affordances for edge cases and use cases rather than a simple, active majority. The uncle at the kopitiam who uses SingPass to check his CPF every week is as important to us as the corporate bigwig whose wife logs in on his behalf once a month.
We’re therefore concerned not only with our participants’ digital behaviors, but also their familiarity with technology, how they like to learn, who they learn from and their life experiences. Recruiting for diversity (and outside of our own personal networks) gives us the confidence that each participant brings something different to the table, and makes our understanding of the world richer and more nuanced.
Research recruitment is resource intensive. Depending on the use case, every round of research requires different participants: Are we looking for parents who need to manage their children’s identity documents? Caregivers who help elderly citizens with their healthcare appointments? Besides using online screeners to identify suitable participants, we also call them to understand their experiences better before meeting in person.
Recruitment is both art and science, and a skill that design researchers can only hone through experience and practice.
Understanding real life emotions and stories
Digital services do not happen in a vacuum, so why should design research? Rather than only user testing within a lab, we meet participants where they are most likely to make digital transactions — at their homes and workplaces, or in public. User research is like traveling and trying to understand as much as you can of an unfamiliar land. While we don’t claim to know our participants inside out within a session, having deeper insight into one person’s life can help us build better digital services for them.
Testing for feature feasibility helps support product design. For instance, contrary to our initial assumptions, people were perfectly happy to tap on a QR code to log in on the mobile web. But the richness of user research comes in the form of real life stories shared with us. Beyond its functions, identity transactions (digital or otherwise) have emotional implications.
- Fear: Having been stuck at customs multiple times because his thumbprint didn’t work, a techy grandpa is sceptical of biometrics authentication: “What if it doesn’t match, then there is no other way to prove who I am!”
- Pride: The auntie who keeps her PAssion Silver Concession card in a special pouch because it acts as her key to unlock many services and discounts, and speaks to her ‘Pioneer Generation’ identity.
- Excitement: An unusually speedy identity verification process stirs curiosity and interest for a busy participant who finds it a chore to interact with the government.
These stories give us the cues and context to create a product that resonates with users.
Uncovering assumptions with hands-on prototypes
Building a digital identity is not solely about porting over physical identity documents, but also about supporting people in their important life events.
As we continue to build SingPass Mobile, we’re always looking to work with more citizens in uncovering gaps in our world view and identifying opportunities for new ideas. We’ve introduced slightly unconventional ways of provoking grounded responses, like setting up a digital transaction process entirely in cardboard for a walk-through.
By offering participants a hands-on experience, we are able to have a more concrete discussion on their perception and behaviour. A simple example is the login process that SingPass Mobile supports: Participants responded to the cognitive load of learning a new digital ritual by relating it to their current understanding: “Seems to be an extra step? Is this 3FA?”
From the scenarios used in research, we have observed:
- The importance of friction when filling up forms vs having an instant click-through. Feeling that the process is “too fast!” can also be an issue when it comes to balancing trust in the app with convenience.
- The complex relationships between individuals in important identity verification transactions. For instance, elderly folks might be assisted by family members or domestic helpers in public places, and couples would share documents in a HDB-purchase process even before a formal union.
- The physical markers that matter when identity documents are verified by an authority figure. Participants talked about the identifiers, e.g. uniforms, locations, and artefacts, that they recognise before handing over their identity cards.
By exploring these scenarios, we moved from the idea of simply translating a physical identity card visually into a digital form, to breaking down the real usage of an ID and understanding where we can really make a difference in daily transactions, while retaining trust through key markers and emotional cues.
Creating real world impact
SingPass Mobile, just like any other government app or service we build, lives within a larger ecosystem. With good user research, product goes beyond its usability and functionality to become an experience that fits the user’s habits and environment.
Since the launch of the app last year, we have continued to test new iterations of SingPass Mobile, and it is always encouraging to hear during user testing that we are validated in the little details — from reordering screens in the onboarding process for easier comprehension, to offering users the choice to hide sensitive details just in case they are checking MyInfo on a crowded MRT. (Coming soon to an app near you!)
Taken alone, these considerations may seem trivial; but by understanding and designing for our users, we create a little more trust in every encounter they have with today’s digital government.
Be part of our journey
SingPass Mobile is a stepping stone on our journey towards creating a truly inclusive National Digital Identity experience.
We hope that citizens will continue to participate in our design research, and offer their feedback to make our products and experiences better.
Sign up here as a potential research participant to help us with our ongoing design research, prototyping and testing now.
