Weeknotes 27th January 2023

How have I made a difference

Highlight of this week was our user research community away day, brilliantly organised by Lisa and Sara and supported by a team of colleagues on the day. For this away day we convened it across health organisations, not just NHS Digital as we knew that the topic would be useful to people wider than our organisation. I was going to say that it is strange that away days now mean going into the office, but on this occasion a water main scuppered that line. Around 8.30 on the day we were told the office had to close as there was no running water and we no longer had a venue. It was a hybrid remote/in-person event and we could have switched to fully remote bar the fact that there were about 50 people on their way to Leeds already.

There’s nothing like an urgent problem to show just what a brilliant, resourceful, supportive and collaborative community we have. No venue. No problem. We will sort it. We all started contacting people we knew to find an alternate venue and by 9.15 we had one that would be ready for us by the time the event was due to start. People made sure colleagues that may not be able to check their email knew of the new venue, we also left a note on the office building door and big thanks to Simon who offered to stand outside it in the cold to direct anyone we missed. Each and every one of us made a difference to ensure that the away day went ahead and no one was left wandering around Leeds. Big thanks to Lisa who took on the tricky task of finding a venue for the 32 people who planned to go for a meal afterwards, collected everyone’s deposits and orders only for the venue also to have to shut due to no water.

The focus of our away day was in-person user research. There are some people that only started doing user research in health over the past few years and, because of covid restrictions, may be new to conducting face to face user research in this setting. This was an opportunity for everyone to learn and refresh their knowledge about how to do in person user research ethically and safely and we had some great sessions about ethics and safeguarding.

Like many organisations, our current in-person user research guidance was developed during covid. We are in a different phase of covid now, we are meeting face to face and there aren’t any specific government restrictions. Irrespective of that we still have the same duty of care to our participants and to ourselves as researchers.

As user researchers we have ethical and safeguarding policies that we need to abide by. This includes ensuring that any research we do does not cause risk of harm to others. Face to face user research guidance is another aspect of ethical and safe working. It is part of the ethics and safeguarding conversations we should be having as part of our day to day user research work and planning.

Context is incredibly important in user research and conducting it remotely can lead to gaps in our knowledge and understanding of the impact of our products and sevices on people’s lives. We do however always have to balance risk and value in our data collection. We need to bring considerations about risk to participant’s health and risk to our health into our ethics considerations when we are planning user research, things like

• Should we be in an enclosed space with someone who has a health condition that makes them more vulnerable to illness (or the people that care for them)?
• Do we really need to do research face to face? What information will we miss if we do it remotely? Does the benefit outweigh the risk?
• Are you exposing that health or care environment to extra risk? It is not just covid that is an issue, there are many other viruses etc. that we need to make sure we are not passing on.

What we are doing isn’t removing face to face user research guidance, we are evolving it into part of what we do to ensure we meet research standards. We need to consider whether our research is ethical and safe from a number of angles and embed what we have learnt during covid into our every day practice.

Next week NHS Digital becomes part of the new to new NHS England and another highlight this week was our farewell event where we showcased all the brilliant work of our organisation and what is has delivered for the NHS. We have come so far in user research and UCD in NHS digital and I am proud of the difference my colleagues, community and I have made to create the space for this to happen. I will be sad so see the NHS Digital name go but merging with NHS England is the right thing to do and brings us even greater opportunity to conduct user research and deliver products that directly support front line NHS. To be honest, on 1st Feb the biggest change will be the organisation in my email signature. I will still be Head of User Research and continue to lead the same fabulous people I do now.

I also made a difference this week representing patient voice at the BRCA Direct steering board, the study that has informed the BRCA community testing that launches next week and has great potential to save lives. I am also making a difference in work I am doing relating to UCD professions as we move into the new organisation.

What do I need to do to make more of a difference

I need to continue to be me and work in the way that upholds my values. Whilst it has its moments, I do genuinely enjoy my job and the away day brought one of the reasons why to the forefront of my thoughts.

People.

Supporting, developing, leading, creating space and infrastructure and amplifying their voice. The organisation in my email signature might change, but what I do, how I do it and who I am as a leader wont.

Next week

• Wrapping up some of the work on the urgent ask
• Profession work
• Catch up with a mentee
• Joining the new NHS England