UX Researcher at Ontario Digital Service
For four months, I was a part of the UX researchers at Ontario Digital Service's User Research Lab.
The lab's mission is to build user-centred products and services using this dedicated research space that’s open to all Ontario government teams. The lab is home to user research experts who support government teams with the tools, guidance and best practices to create and scale user-centred service design practices.
Role – UX Researcher & Designer
Timeline – Co-op placement, Sep 2020 - Dec 2020
Skills – Usability testing, Journey Mapping, Persona Making, Surveys, Recommendations & Report Writing
Led User Research
COVID-19 School and Child Care Screening Tool
As a UX Researcher at the ODS, I was given the opportunity to lead a research project regarding updating the Ontario school and child care screening tool. This entailed outlining the research objectives, forming the screener questionnaire to get qualified participants for our user testing sessions and compiling all findings into a digestible report slide deck that was then presented to stakeholders at the Ministry of Education. This research directly affected students and children in child care centres across Ontario. This entire project from start to finish lasted around four weeks.
Research Objectives:
• Learn about users’ experiences visiting Ontario schools and childcare facilities, as context for iterative product development.
• Explore the usefulness of this tool for users and schools/childcare facilities.
• Examine which tools people are using for COVD-19 screening
• Evaluate the usability and comprehensibility of the tool.
• Learn about users’ experiences visiting Ontario schools and childcare facilities, as context for iterative product development.
• Explore the usefulness of this tool for users and schools/childcare facilities.
• Examine which tools people are using for COVD-19 screening
• Evaluate the usability and comprehensibility of the tool.
Visit screening tool.
I along with my team conducted 14 1-on-1 semi-structured interviews we then compiled our findings onto a shared Miro board to see where the overlap and patterns were, we then compiled this into data sets and created the report.
• We asked participants to talk about their experiences, we wanted to know more about their current process of entering a school or childcare facility.
• We invited participants to imagine a scenario, we directed them to the Ontario COVID-19 School and Childcare screening page. We watched and listened as they went through it, taking notes.
• We asked about previous experiences with other COVID screening tools.
We were then able to formulate high-level findings along with detailed ones that led us to a list of recommendations to improve the version of the screening tool at the time.
The goal of the Ontario Research Lab
Provide user research leadership and support for the Ontario Public Service to design services that are better for people.
Some of the services we offered at the research lab:
• Resources and tools
• Advice and collaboration - work on research with other teams
• Research delivery - run a research project for you
• Weekly Drop-ins - People from the Ontario Public Service come to seek or contribute advice
Recommendations implemented into a second version of another COVID-19 screener
Some other exciting research I got to work on
🦌 Moose Hunt Tag Allocation Process - Interactive Voice Response (IVR) Script
The Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry (MNRF) requested user research from the lab to better understand if their new IVR phone system script would do a good job explaining to moose hunters the new hunting regulations. We conducted user testing with new and long-time hunters and gathered feedback, recommended solutions and presented our recommendations back to the ministry.
💼 Ontario Immigration Nominee Program - Online Application Portal
We interviewed past and present applicants of the Ontario Immigration Nominee Program, to better understand their experiences filling out the online application. We conducted user interviews with applicants from across the world. We analyzed the research data and presented the findings to the ministry.
🚘 Service Ontario Licenses and Plates and Vehicles - Chatbot Implementation
The Ministry of Government & Consumer Services reached out to the Research Lab to see if we could explore the use of a chatbot to see if this would result in a contact centre call reduction. We conducted user research sessions with Ontarians from diverse backgrounds to hear their thoughts on automated chatbots and presented the findings along with recommendations to the ministry.
Post user testing, we would always collect and categorize our findings on a collaborative Miro board
Takeaways
Working in-depth in the user research stage of the UX design process, helped me understand the importance of speaking and empathizing with end-users. User research is a key step in designing useful and intuitive products, it's crucial to have some form of user research done to ensure users' needs and expectations are met. Being exposed to the various methods of user research all played a foundational role in my UX knowledge.
