Reflections on the user-centred design communities team

This blog post reflects on how the GDS user-centred design (UCD) communities worked together to advocate for UCD across government and deliver better public services.
This blog post reflects on how the GDS user-centred design (UCD) communities worked together to advocate for UCD across government and deliver better public services.
GDS’s design team grew since moving to remote working in March. For the new designers, it meant having a different start. In this blog post, 5 of them share their experiences, what it was like and what was challenging.
Hundreds of designers in all parts of the UK government are longing for exchange while mostly working remotely. A recent design buddy group pilot brought over 170 of them together. In this blog post, the initiators share what they did and what’s next.
Designers are all inspired to support and encourage other people to achieve their career goals. The challenge can be in fitting this alongside your day job. Senior service designer Kay Dale gives 3 tips on how you can support them more effectively.
There is a new community of practice for anyone working on services that collect, analyse, visualise and publish data and applying a user-centred lens to them. This blog post introduces the community and describes its purpose, code of conduct, and the areas it will focus on.
After being the first service designer at Stockport Council, Lisa Kowalewski reflects on her last 2.5 years in local government and shares 10 key learnings – applicable to many parts of the public sector.
As part of the GDS design community’s efforts to improve the equity of the team, Ignacia and Leon share their research findings on inclusion and exclusion in the community.
As part of our ongoing Design in Government profile series, we hear from 3 designers of the Ministry of Justice Digital team about how they work, what they do, and what it means to them.
What should a portfolio look like when applying for a design role in government? Whatever your experience level, in this post you’ll find advice on how to shape a good portfolio, what is expected of you and why having and updating a portfolio is important.
Designers in government have adapted to the new circumstances, altered their ways of working and adopted new tools. For this blog post, we reached out to various service designers from different government organisations to hear how they are working under the changed environment.