Why public servants should prototype before they pilot

This article is written by Jessica Zéroual, research and human-centered design advisor at the Treasury Board Secretariat for the Government of Canada

Over the past few years, I’ve worked on various projects that have used human-centered design and design thinking. One of the biggest challenges I’ve faced as a designer is the prototyping phase of the design process. Here, I want to provide public servants with a guide on how that process works best, and why this matters.

Working at the helm of these approaches to serve people better in my country has been consistently stimulating. Yet, whether it’s debunking myths about the process, explaining the return on investment, or soliciting buy-in from stakeholders to create visual blueprints of ideas to convince decision-makers, prototyping remains a challenge.

Let’s say you have used design thinking to help generate ideas with users and experts for a specific programme. Your idea is grounded in the realities of your users’ lives, and you are excited to share it with senior management. Surely now all that’s left is for you to present your idea, and wait for all the eyes looking back at you to light up. Right? Well, not quite. There is still some work to do before you share it with the world.

Prototyping versus piloting

I often hear colleagues use ‘pilot’ and ‘prototype’ interchangeably. As public servants, we are all typically in a rush, but when it comes to using human-centered design on complex policies, programmes or services, it is important to define these concepts carefully. To do this, I find it is useful for people to understand what both principles mean for projects, as this shows why they are different.

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Pilots typically take time and are costly. They also leave little room for course correction. They are used when you believe you have the answers, and so are measured on the basis of success or failure. Their focus tends to be observing behaviours around actual solutions. A pilot is the prelude to scaling up a solution for an entire population.

By contrast, prototypes are fast, cheap and are there to galvanise new ways of thinking about a particular problem. They tend to be used when you have a hypothetical answer, but no results. Their job is to help you build towards that answer, and so are measured by how much you have learned in the process, and what you did with the information. By contrast, their focus is on learning whether or not your concept fulfils a need. Prototypes can be developed in low-resolution or high-resolution, but either way they’re there to be tested with stakeholders and users.

We don’t know what users really want until we ask them. Prototyping provides the space in which to ask and act on the answers.

I always like using this video, a scene taken from the 2016 film ‘The founder’, which helps people wrap their heads around the concept. There are various prototyping tools you can use to bring your idea to life, including storyboards, wireframes, role playing and even blueprints. Prototypes are visual representations that allow anyone to see the ins and outs of your idea. It focuses on addressing different components, such as steps, actors and levers in an idea. It provides clarity of design, early feedback, time and cost savings, feasibility evaluation, and momentum in marketing communication.

So you see, prototyping and piloting are not the same thing. Thinking of them interchangeably is like thinking of a matinee performance and a dress rehearsal interchangeably. Not a good idea.

Prototyping in the public service

In my last Apolitical opinion piece, I wrote about the design process and getting buy-in from senior management. I got some comments and questions about real-life examples.

A few years ago, I had the opportunity to work directly with young Canadians from three coasts — British Columbia, Newfoundland and Nunavut — to help inform the development of a national youth service programme. We used design thinking to engage young people on three major aspects of the programme, including a digital platform, incentives and mentorship models. Instead of using traditional consultation models, such as rountables, we created workshops that allowed them to share their lived experience and help generate solutions that would be useful to them and other young Canadians looking to participate in this programme.

One of my favorite memories was a workshop in Thunder Bay Ontario, where the Students Commission of Canada, a grassroots youth organisation, helped us recruit young people from the city and surrounding areas to prototype ideas other young people had proposed in other workshops across Canada.

Subsequently, we were able to share and validate insights generated in those other workshops in our first phase on youth engagement. Participants were able to interact with material other young Canadians had shared, which made it more exciting and relatable for them. Many participants ended up using ideas proposed by other young people to develop a prototype that day. Before jumping into the prototyping phase, we did an empathy building exercise in which participants shared their day-to-day challenges. Some young people in Northern Ontario, including those living outside of cities and commuting to school or work, balance playing an active role as a caretaker for younger siblings with their homework, after school activities and personal growth.

In breakout groups, the participants then applied prototyping tools to bring their ideas to life. As a facilitator, I created an activity to test what had been developed in the small group setting in the morning session. This activity was called the Thunder Round. One participant from each group had to move to another group, listen to their prototype, and provide feedback for a period of 10 minutes. Once we had gone through a few rounds like this, everyone returned to their original teams and integrated the feedback.

To conclude, my co-facilitator and I engaged in a plenary discussion, where participants were able to present their prototypes. Each group had tackled a different idea using a different tool. In the end, we had a digital platform made using a wireframe, a mentorship model that was designed through role play, and an incentive model to support youth financially through a storyboard.

Having achieved this level of detail to design a strong national programme, we can look now at how we might do so within a government context. As a designer, this experience provided me with insights I could recommend to decision-makers. As a human being, it allowed me to connect with participants who had such a great diversity of life experiences. It helped me build a bridge that not only left a positive mark on participants, but also on myself.

As we move towards more human-centered design approaches, I hope public servants start to understand the unique powers of prototyping, and use it to create quality pilots. Whether you are rolling a programme out in your organisation, or providing a service to others outside your organisation, prototyping helps you get it right by designing directly with the user. We don’t know what users really want until we ask them. Prototyping provides the space in which to ask and act on the answers. — Jessica Zéroual

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