Design research vs. consultations
Design research is different than traditional government consultations.
Consultations often:
- Focus on gathering the public’s views, ideas and concerns
- Involve not just the public, but experts, stakeholders and representatives of interested organizations
- Include public servants sharing their own views, concerns, ideas and proposals
- Happen before major program changes, but not repeatedly
Design research has a:
- Different purpose: Design research focuses on understanding people’s goals, behaviors and blockers. It examines how people current use (or would use) a service, not their ideas for it.
- Different audience: Design research studies people involved in a service. It doesn’t study their proxies, be they experts, advocates, or other stakeholders.
- Different style of engagement: Design research doesn’t ask people’s wants. It focuses on identifying what they need from a service based on their goals and blockers. Design researchers also focus on listening to the public. They don’t share their own ideas or engage in debate with participants.
- Different frequency: Design research happens a little and often. It should happen monthly, not yearly.
Design research can complement traditional consultation processes.
- Design research studies how people actually use (or would use) a service, not just their ideas for it. It focuses on what people need based on their behaviors, not wishes. Consultation gathers views, but less data about how people actually use a service.
- Design research raises the voices of people who use a service. Consultations valuably surface the views of all a service’s stakeholders. But without design research, we can mistake stakeholder opinions for users’ needs.
- Design research minimizes risk throughout project development. Design research happens a little and often throughout the services life. Without it, we don’t know whether the ideas we hear at the beginning actually help
- Last updated by Colin on June 6, 2019