Unit 4

Learning Outcome 1

By the end of Unit 4 students will be able to explain what good design is, why it matters, and why bad design is costly and counterproductive. This includes the ideas that:

• Government should value the public's time and experience.

• Bad design in government policy and services disproportionately impacts minority, marginalized or disadvantaged communities.

• The costs of failing to prioritise the needs of users are real, and can be substantial. These costs can be seen in the stories of unsuccessful government projects of many different types.

• Traditional evaluation of government projects is centered on whether projects were delivered on budget, on time and to the original specification, not by an assessment of whether the project works or has the intended outcomes.

Learning Outcome 2

By the end of Unit 4 students will be able to describe the human-centered design (HCD) methodology (or framework), and related practices and techniques. This includes:

• Design research

• Synthesis

• Ideation

• Prototyping

• Iteration

Learning Outcome 3

By the end of Unit 4 students will be able to understand how human-centered design can be useful in a public policy context. This means understanding why public servants need to employ human-centered design skills in all the following situations:

• When trying to decide how to solve a problem for the public;

• When developing any piece of technology, including for internal governmental use;

• When improving an existing product or service;

• When developing and implementing new policy, services & legislation.

Learning Outcome 4

By the end of Unit 4 students will be able to describe some of the skills a team would need in order to use human-centered design to address a problem or improve a service.

This includes recognizing there are many different user research and design mechanisms (not just one), and understanding that many different approaches are required to comprehensively and effectively remake a service.

Learning Outcome 5

By the end of Unit 4 students will be able to apply a basic design exercise to develop a better understanding of a problem. This means being able to identify, choose and deploy an appropriate design method to investigate a problem, whilst recognising that students cannot expect to learn a full suite of methods in an introductory course like this one.

Learning Outcome 6

By the end of Unit 4 students will be able to describe the meaning and importance of accessibility. This includes:

• Principles of access for people with disability, language, literacy or contextual constraints.

• Being able to give examples of accessibility technologies