1.2 Explore User Needs and Identify Problems
Understand users and challenges
Get a shared understanding of users and decide what to learn from them during Discovery by:
identifying who the users of the service are
understanding different user groups and perspectives
agreeing which user needs are most important to explore
preparing a focused approach to user research
This activity supports user-centred decision-making without requiring in-depth research capability.
How to decide which users to focus on
Identify users List the different people or groups who use, deliver, or are affected by the service.
Group users Group your identified users, discuss how these users differ, including their goals, constraints, and contexts. You can also consider scenarios that impact how they access a service, for example, low or no-connectivity.
Prioritise users Agree which user groups are most important to understand at this stage and why.
Consider accessibility and barriers to inclusion Review the guidance on accessibility and inclusion barriers.
Draft personas Create simple personas that can be referenced and kept in mind throughout the design stage.
How to learn more about users
1. Prepare learning questions
Agree a small set of questions about user needs, barriers, or behaviours that the team needs answers to. Focus on what users are trying to achieve, where they struggle, and what happens when the service does not work as expected.
2. Decide how to answer the questions
For each question, agree the simplest way to learn something useful. This could include short interviews with users, conversations with frontline staff, observation, or reviewing existing data like complaints or usage metrics.
3. Plan research interviews
If you plan to interview users, agree which user groups to involve, how many conversations are realistic, who will carry out the research, and when it will take place. Prepare a short discussion guide to help keep the conversation focused. Use prompts to support listening and exploration, but avoid over-structuring the interview or relying on a long list of direct questions.
4. Analyse findings
Review what you have learned and identify common patterns, challenges, and differences between user groups. Read more about analysing findings.
5. Describe user routines
Summarise what users are trying to do, the steps they take, and where things break down. Use these routines to inform later activities such as journey mapping and to-be design. You might write these up following a user stories or jobs-to-be-done framework.
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