Record insights from in person observation

Seeing how people use your service in a face-to-face setting can provide quick feedback on what works well or what needs improvement.

It is an inexpensive method to learn about users’ interaction with a product or service.

You can use this resource when observing people at a service point. It is also an opportunity to speak with them and find out more about their experience. Once completed, you’ll get insight that will inform your next steps.

When to get insights from in person observation

You can complete this activity when exploring a problem space or at any point in your project when you need feedback. By doing this often, you can collect insight that might highlight a change you had not considered before.

It can be helpful:

when you want to observe people using your service in an informal setting
to prompt conversation about areas you hope to improve. This ensures your next steps consider user needs
to get feedback on initial ideas for a possible solution. For example, getting first impressions on rough sketches to validate an idea

This is one way of getting quick insight. Other methods include:

How to get insights from in person observation

Use this activity to:

define your research goals and what you want to learn
think of questions you want to ask people
document your observations during the exercise

Start with a good plan

Before you get started, consider what you want to learn from the research.

Try to understand:

who are the people using your service
what you already know and what you don’t or are unsure about
what key questions you have for them about the service they’re using

You can also do a root cause analysis to understand the reasons why your service users might experience certain problems.

Make any ethical considerations

You should also consider the permissions you’ll need internally and from the people you’ll be observing.

You should:

check with the relevant teams within your council that they are happy for you to listen to their calls
clarify your goals for the day and how you plan to use the insights gained from this activity
reassure them this is not about monitoring their performance

This will help explain your intentions and motivate them to contribute their experience.

If you plan to engage with people outside your council, consider if you’ll need a consent form. For more information, read GOV.UK guidance on getting informed consent for user research.

Consider any safeguarding for yourself and for the people you’ll meet on the day.

What you can do next

Analyse the insights and create a summary report.

Use the insights to identify opportunities that will solve the problems you’ve learned about.

Share the knowledge

Do not keep all the learnings to yourself. Make them accessible, actionable and useful for current and future projects. It does not have to be within your council only. Sharing it allows other councils to learn about people’s needs. The Localgov.digital user research library is a good example of how to share findings within and across councils.

Continue updating the repository with new user research findings to keep it relevant and up-to-date.

Inform decisions

Share any learnings with stakeholders and other service teams in your council. This creates a common understanding of people’s needs and behaviours. You can make a case for testing assumptions and ideas before committing to a solution. For example:

If you cannot access the document

You can recreate this resource in a format that suits you.

Think of the best way to get quick insight by observing or talking to people. For example, an in-person service point or somewhere with computers for public use.
Create a list of goals for this activity. Think about who the key service users might be, and the problems they may experience. For example, where in their journey people get stuck, what they need to do and if there are common problems across different tasks or services.
List some questions you might want to ask when you speak with people. For example, a thing they would change or keep about a service, how they would describe this service to a friend, a good or bad experience they have had with a council.
Create a board or table to record notes.
On the day, use the table or board to document observations such as what questions people ask while using the service, how long it takes to use the service from start to end, if they can do everything they need to do, at what point they need help, and the type of help they need, how they feel about the experience.
You can also record any interesting quotes or general notes.
For each person, note what type of user they are, the service they interact with, the task they are trying to complete, and any questions they answer.
After the exercise, organise your notes by themes. For example, user group, type of problem, pain points, and opportunities for improvement.

Tips for this activity