diff --git a/.github/workflows/test-urls.yml b/.github/workflows/test-urls.yml index f4ccae011..737a6b6ba 100644 --- a/.github/workflows/test-urls.yml +++ b/.github/workflows/test-urls.yml @@ -31,4 +31,4 @@ jobs: run: npm run build && npm run start-detached - name: Test for broken URLs - run: bundle exec htmlproofer --http-status-ignore "403,406,429,503,999" --url-swap "https\://digitalcorps.gsa.gov:" _site + run: bundle exec htmlproofer --http-status-ignore "0,403,406,429,503,999" --url-swap "https\://digitalcorps.gsa.gov:" _site diff --git a/_assets/images/blogs/10-3_Blog.png b/_assets/images/blogs/10-3_Blog.png new file mode 100644 index 000000000..a3d5c42ec Binary files /dev/null and b/_assets/images/blogs/10-3_Blog.png differ diff --git a/_assets/images/blogs/10-3_Blog_v2.png b/_assets/images/blogs/10-3_Blog_v2.png new file mode 100644 index 000000000..1d0756e70 Binary files /dev/null and b/_assets/images/blogs/10-3_Blog_v2.png differ diff --git a/_assets/images/blogs/10-3_Blog_v3.png b/_assets/images/blogs/10-3_Blog_v3.png new file mode 100644 index 000000000..35ab25f43 Binary files /dev/null and b/_assets/images/blogs/10-3_Blog_v3.png differ diff --git a/_assets/images/fellows/2022/Julie Winston.png b/_assets/images/fellows/2022/Julie Winston.png deleted file mode 100644 index 19eb597b6..000000000 Binary files a/_assets/images/fellows/2022/Julie Winston.png and /dev/null differ diff --git a/_assets/images/fellows/2022/julie-winston.png b/_assets/images/fellows/2022/julie-winston.png new file mode 100644 index 000000000..5f1bdda36 Binary files /dev/null and b/_assets/images/fellows/2022/julie-winston.png differ diff --git a/_assets/images/projects/state_nica_image.jpeg b/_assets/images/projects/state_nica_image.jpeg new file mode 100644 index 000000000..9075e8a42 Binary files /dev/null and b/_assets/images/projects/state_nica_image.jpeg differ diff --git a/_blogs/improving-customer-experience-for-the-public-across-life-experiences.md b/_blogs/improving-customer-experience-for-the-public-across-life-experiences.md new file mode 100644 index 000000000..c9a878159 --- /dev/null +++ b/_blogs/improving-customer-experience-for-the-public-across-life-experiences.md @@ -0,0 +1,42 @@ +--- +id: cx-life-experience-2023-10 +title: 'Fellow Perspectives: Improving customer experience for the public across life experiences' +image: 10-3_Blog_v3.png +author: Chris Kuang +published_at: "2023-10-03" +summary: "Three USDC Fellows share their work supporting two inaugural life experience projects at the Department of Health and Human Services: Having a Child and Early Childhood, and Facing a Financial Shock." +external_url: "" +tags: ['Design', 'Product_Management','HHS','HRSA','Public_experience'] +type: Blog +--- + +In December 2021, President Joe Biden signed the [Executive Order](https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2021/12/13/executive-order-on-transforming-federal-customer-experience-and-service-delivery-to-rebuild-trust-in-government/) on Transforming Federal Customer Experience and Service Delivery to Rebuild Trust in Government. The Executive Order laid out a new vision for customer experience (CX), defined as the public perception and overall satisfaction with interactions with any government agency, product, or service, to be prioritized under the [President’s Management Agenda](https://www.performance.gov/pma/cx/). As part of the Executive Order’s mandate, federal agencies have been asked to focus on significant events or transitions that members of the public encounter in their lives (“life experiences”) that often require interactions and touchpoints with multiple federal agencies. These [inaugural “Life Experience” projects](https://www.performance.gov/cx/projects/) aim to improve government CX across the lifespan from birth through retirement and to build a new, human-centered approach to government. + +Today, on "CX Day"—October 3, 2023—hear from our fellows supporting two of the inaugural LE projects at the Department of Health and Human Services: [Having a Child and Early Childhood](https://www.performance.gov/cx/life-experiences/having-a-child-and-early-childhood-for-low-income-families/) and [Facing a Financial Shock](https://www.performance.gov/cx/life-experiences/facing-a-financial-shock/), + +## Having a Child and Early Childhood + +### Samantha Noshin Noor, Design Fellow + +In 2021, [41% of births](https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/births.htm) in the U.S. were covered by Medicaid, the government program that provides health coverage to low-income people. These numbers underscore the meaningful impact of government support and raise a critical question: how many more people require support but remain unconnected? The Having a Child and Early Childhood life experience team aims to address this gap by increasing support for mothers and caregivers of young children. My role involves implementing a [Benefits Bundle](https://assets.performance.gov/cx/files/life-experiences/2023/CX-2023_Early-Childhood_Life+Experience_Design-Project-Summaries.pdf) pilot, connecting families with peer navigators in their communities to deliver a person-centered benefits enrollment experience. + +Drawing on trauma-informed practices and service design, I collaborate with communities to vision cast and refine an enhanced CX. This involves delving deep into their context, needs, and impacts of the current system. A critical aspect of my work includes relationship-building with communities through site visits, community dialogue sessions, and gathering feedback as the pilot unfolds. This ensures that the voice of the community is integrated into the services we are delivering. Beyond simplifying the benefits enrollment process, we are also fostering shared community experiences and improving health outcomes of families during this critical phase of their lives. Our goal goes further than just improving government CX; it aims to initiate systemic change from the grassroots and rebuild trust in government along the way. + +## Facing a Financial Shock + +### Kennedy Alexis, Product Management Fellow + +Good CX is the outcome of incorporating human-centered design intentionally into our processes, policies, and digital services. All too often, accessing benefits has felt like a very tedious and grueling process for many families in need. In 2015, Michigan had the [longest benefit application](https://civilla.org/work/project-reform) at 40 pages and with the help of design experts who incorporated human-centered design practices and research into their processes, Michigan’s application has reduced by 80%. What was once a formidable barrier for 2.5 million Michigan residents, is now an example of how the government can deliver good CX. +On the Facing Financial Shock Accelerator team, our mission is to support states to replicate and deliver this level of impact to their residents. We are doing so by understanding state individualized and collective pain points in benefit delivery, providing them with the educational and technical resources to improve their systems. Ultimately, this will provide Americans with clear pathways for finding, applying, and receiving benefits quickly and easily. + +As the Product Fellow, it is my role to make sure we’re building the right thing. To do so, I’ve supported the implementation of human- centered design facilitation strategies to ensure that we’re correctly understanding user problems and am continuously incorporating agile methodologies into our processes. FFS has also been a cross-agency project where we are continuously breaking the silos within government to ensure we’re learning from each other and building deliverables that can impact CX at benefits delivery agencies across government. + +### Louisa Sholar, Design Fellow + +As a designer, I draw on a variety of disciplines and subdisciplines in my work, including user experience, accessibility, content strategy, and, most importantly, service design. In service design, my colleagues and I aren’t just thinking about digital products. Service design is about the entire ecosystem of what it takes for a service to be provided and delivered, fully considering all stakeholders, touchpoints, and circumstances. While the digital delivery of benefits is a critical focus area for states and the federal agencies that oversee specific programs, as Kennedy mentioned, not all of our deliverables or efforts will have a technology-specific output. + +In my role, I help ensure the resources we develop for states reflect key design and service design best practices and help guide our working groups through the design and discovery sprints we use to gather feedback. I’m also helping design a new federal benefits evaluation framework that will encourage states to focus on program outcomes and CX metrics rather than fraud detection and program integrity alone. By leveraging that approach, we hope to drive culture at the local, state, and national levels to redefine what success should look like within benefits delivery and make metrics consistent across programs. That’s part of what makes working on a Life Experience project unique within government: when we explicitly center members of the public and their needs in terms of policy or program outcomes, we often end up with different strategies to better meet those goals. + +--- + +_U.S. Digital Corps Fellows work on [high-impact projects](https://digitalcorps.gsa.gov/projects/) across government. Applications for our 2024 Fellow cohort will open this fall. Subscribe to [our newsletter](https://public.govdelivery.com/accounts/USGSATTS/subscriber/new?topic_id=USGSATTS_108) and follow us on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/usdigitalcorps) and [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/company/74725557/admin/feed/posts/) to stay updated on upcoming events and opportunities to apply._ diff --git a/_fellows/2022/julie-winston.md b/_fellows/2022/julie-winston.md index eaef2b23f..e36385d77 100644 --- a/_fellows/2022/julie-winston.md +++ b/_fellows/2022/julie-winston.md @@ -1,7 +1,7 @@ --- id: julie-winston title: Julie Winston -image: Julie Winston.png +image: julie-winston.png fellow_year: 2022 project: ["dos-managing-a-crisis-with-data-and-empathy", "state-department-leveraging-data-to-support-the-release-of-222-nicaraguan-political-prisoners"] agency: ["DOS"] diff --git a/_projects/state-department-leveraging-data-to-support-the-release-of-222-nicaraguan-political-prisoners.md b/_projects/state-department-leveraging-data-to-support-the-release-of-222-nicaraguan-political-prisoners.md index e39409b25..62e5e27c2 100644 --- a/_projects/state-department-leveraging-data-to-support-the-release-of-222-nicaraguan-political-prisoners.md +++ b/_projects/state-department-leveraging-data-to-support-the-release-of-222-nicaraguan-political-prisoners.md @@ -1,7 +1,7 @@ --- id: state-nica agency: "Department of State" -agency_abbrev: "State" +agency_abbrev: "Department of State" agency_logo: "DOS.webp" title: "Leveraging data to support the emergency release of 222 Nicaraguan political prisoners" project_name: "Leveraging data to support the emergency release of 222 Nicaraguan political prisoners" @@ -18,6 +18,10 @@ impact_area: ["Immigration"] status: ["current"] --- +
+ {% asset "state_nica_image.jpeg" class="" alt="Department of State workers standing outside building." %} +
+ ## The challenge Amid almost 5 years of massive political suppression and imprisonment of hundreds of political rivals, activists, students, journalists, business and religious leaders, and members of civil society at large, on February 9, 2023, Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega suddenly announced the release of 222 political prisoners into U.S. custody. At the time of their release, the Nicaraguan government stripped the parolees of their citizenship, rendering them stateless. The State Department in partnership with Department of Homeland Security Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Agency for International Development, Department of Health and Human Services, Executive Office of the President, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and Virginia state and local agencies, quickly mobilized a task force to accomplish three primary goals in response to this humanitarian crisis: 1. Welcome the parolees to the United States safely and with dignity; @@ -31,11 +35,6 @@ Three U.S. Digital Corps Fellows joined the M/SS/CfA data task force to manage t * USDC Fellows also contributed to the **daily production of Secretary of State and White House operation reports** and ensured reporting metrics provided detailed status updates on parolees throughout the process. In addition, Fellows regularly provided data extracts for NGOs providing ongoing legal and psychological support to the parolees, and produced ad-hoc reports for the Operations Center, hotel liaison team, and the Virginia state government. * Last but not least, USDC Fellows were critical in **developing family reunification and community reintegration reporting criteria**, collecting data to track departures, and liaising with NGOs, the hotel team, and the Operations Center to ensure all parolees had ongoing support once the task force concluded. -In the next phase, the Fellows interviewed two groups of users affected by the Safety and Well Being Follow Up Call: leaders of home study and post-release services programs, who would implement the new process, and case aides, who currently conduct calls. After five hours of calls, the team was better able to empathize and understand the perspectives of the callers, sponsors, and children. They learned that one of the biggest challenges, for everyone involved, was limited availability of sponsors and children during business hours, when many are working or in school. - -Finally, the Fellows conducted a process map and content audit of the existing universe of procedures, reports, proposals, and a motley of program questionnaires to learn best practices that shelters were already using in their SWB calls. They prepared a proposal of over 30 new plain language questions that incorporated three virtual check-ins at seven business days, 14 business days, and 30 business days after a child’s release to a sponsor. An expanded medical and mental health section would eliminate the need for redundant post-release COVID-19 check-ins. The proposal also included relevant pre-call information, standardized the post-call assessment and escalation process, and coordinated with partners such as the Department of Justice’s Executive Office of Immigration Review. - - ## The impact By leveraging inter-bureau and interagency cooperation **all 222 political prisoners were connected with ongoing support from family, friends, and/or NGOs within six days of their release from prison**.