blueegg was engaged to deliver a myGov notifications capability strategic plan in support of the myGov Enhancements strategy. The plan considered the capabilities required to notify customers in a manner which aligned with their needs and expectations, but also with the business’ product vision.
The project was carried out in three phases: Analysis, Consult, and Strategy. Extensive consideration of the technical capabilities, and legal and privacy restraints, occurred throughout all phases of the project.
To deliver the myGov notifications capability strategic plan to integrate with the new myGov platform. The plan needed to provide insights based on research and user analysis, along with recommendations for future solutions.
Research synthesis
Stakeholder interviews
Subject matter consults
Use case analysis
Notifications classification
User experience review
Strategic roadmap
Service blueprint
Within the Analysis stage, blueegg identified a range of user, technical, privacy and legal matters and related capabilities which informed many of the core themes of the strategic plan. Our analysis informed high-level insights around:
Lack of awareness
Anxiety
Need to track progress
Unclear actions
Handling of sensitive information
Notification hierarchy
Notification classifications
Central place for communication
We conducted analysis of over 35 papers to understand the key themes, findings and direction of the research. It was important not to duplicate any existing research and to utilise the key findings to help us understand edge cases and scenarios that needed to be considered within the Australian context.
A UX audit of the proposed myGov Beta platform was conducted to understand the future experience and identify areas for improvement. We focussed on the overall usability and navigation of the platform from a user’s perspective, as well as the content for each of the services on the platform.
For further context, desktop research was conducted to deepen our understanding of the principles and regulations from a privacy, legal and cyber-security standpoint. We further tested our assumptions and findings from the research during subsequent consultations.
“Deeplinking is not possible for SMS or email” “The sky is the limit when it comes to technical solutions as myGov blue will be a new platform“
”There is no existing notifications classification or hierarchy.”
“It’s important to align with the Whole of Government business case to ensure the notifications strategy success”
Key members of the myGov team - including staff from DTA and Services Australia - were engaged to ensure all requirements and technical landscapes were considered. Through these conversations blueegg was able to uncover additional member service requirements, and provided the opportunity to involve and align all necessary and relevant parties. This allowed for a better understanding of the technical, privacy and legal constraints within each member service, as well as deepening our understanding of the current experience.
Through our consultations it became apparent that there were key insights and pain points that were directly applicable to the notifications experience. We were able to define the primary use cases to focus the strategy and worked closely with DTA and Services Australia stakeholders to create current and future use cases.
To support the notifications strategy, a technical solution will need to be procured that considers the system requirements as well as business and customer needs. To inform this process and understand the technical constraints of the current myGov platform, we conducted consultations with Technical Architects from the myGov project team within Services Australia and DTA. These discussion informed important design considerations and constraints with respect to scalability, availability, performance and security.
The development of the strategic plan involved engagement with multiple member services, as well as smaller government agencies, each with their own unique privacy and legal constraints. Privacy acts and policies such as the Privacy Act 1988, DTA Privacy Policy and Australian Privacy Principles were critical inputs which influenced strategy and design activity for the new notifications to ensure the secure handling and storage of customer data.
Similarly for legal, we familiarised ourselves with relevant data sharing legislation across local, state and federal governments to ensure the legal obligations of each individual member service was taken into account. It was recommended to cite the Spam Act 2003, Data Breach Notification Law 2016 and Consumer Data Right(CDR) Legislation 2017 to understand consent and the complying needs.
Aspects of cyber security were also touched upon in the strategy as being a critical component to protecting the risks and threats such platforms are exposed to, particularly when sharing private data and personal details.
Following extensive analysis and consultation we developed the strategic plan, an extended detailed report and delivered a presentation. The final deliverables included:
Presentation to member services
Strategic roadmap
Notifications routing diagram
Notification flows
Notification classification and hierarchy
UX Audit
Current and proposed use cases
Service blueprint
blueegg presented at a government showcase with key staff from the member services. The notifications strategy was consolidated into a succinct document that covered the key objectives, approach and privacy, legal, and technical considerations. Various member services were consulted and considered throughout the process.
Within the strategy it was important to define notifications and which channels the strategy encompassed, as well as create hierarchies and classification to provide structure to the many notifications that could be sent to the users. This guided the intelligent notification triage that would occur in the recommended technical solution.
A strategic roadmap was provided to highlight the recommended future state and provide steps in the lead up to the future state. It was important to consider that myGov blue would be the new platform and how the notifications experience could be changed iteratively to ensure there was no sudden changes leading to further confusion.
Following the notifications strategy, further work will be done to validate the strategic roadmap and recommendations in the notifications strategic plan.