Inclusive design is the practice of intentionally including the needs of people who experience exclusion in many aspects of their daily lives – throughout our design process.
Design is a structured, creative, problem-solving process.
Why?
- Every decision, in any system, has the potential to unintentionally exclude people.
- Inclusion shouldn’t be an afterthought, it should be built in.
- We can make our work more inclusive if we design with users as part of the process, rather than waiting to hear their views on what we've designed at the end.
First steps for inclusive design
- Person-centred: Put people at the centre of your design process.
- Understand exclusion: Listen to the experiences of people you might be unintentionally excluding.
- Leverage diversity to find your blind spots: Exclusion happens when we solve problems using our own biases. Involve people with different perspectives. Make sure to include the people that have difficulty using your current approaches.
- Start small and simple: Test and refine your ideas to make sure they meet people's needs.
These first steps are informed by the Scottish Government’s Scottish Approach to Service design.
Scottish Approach to Service Design: A framework for designing person-centred services
- The Scottish Approach to Service Design vision is that the people of Scotland should be supported and empowered to actively participate in the definition, design and delivery of public services. All the way from policy making to service improvement.
- It is a framework rather than a template. It helps us build a core ideas and intentions into our organisations. This helps design in a person-centred way. It support us to design the right thing, before designing the thing right.
Learn more about the Scottish Approach to Service design
