This methodology is rooted in the ‘double-diamond’ - a way of thinking developed by the International Design Organisation and used by global organisations to tackle problems and challenges.

It is particularly useful for:

• Long-term challenges where there have been multiple efforts to ‘fix’ the problem
• Problems where the solution requires changing people’s behaviour
• Reducing the risk of a technical project where the solution hasn’t been commonly used

The method breaks into four phases to provide stakeholders the opportunity to stop work or change direction. However, it can be used to guide work differently, depending on the challenge. For example, a ‘Google Sprint’ will use many of these methods in just a week, whilst many technology companies don’t have a ‘discovery’ phase but prefer learning through testing and evaluating live services.

This method has been set out to explain how to develop a digital service, but a successful digital service relies on a business process that is efficient and simple, a consistent approach across other channels (phone, paper, face to face), and clear rules that could be automated. All of these issues will be identified during the research and testing and will need to be tackled through the prototyping, building and improving stages if the ‘end to end’ service is to truly meet user needs.

All digital services in Hackney need to be assessed against the Local Government Digital Service Standard before being live for users. Follow whichever parts of the methodology help you successfully reach the Standard. This is consistent with our manifesto, particularly: People first, More doing, less planning.

The pre-project workshop and diagnosis tool guides you towards the appropriate methodology for your project.

The manual can be followed at each step of the way and the project can still fail if it is not used in the right way. For example, if key stakeholders believe that there is an existing solution and it just needs to be implemented, then few of these techniques will have any value.

The manual will continue to be improved in response to user feedback, so make sure you blog about your work at HackIT