Broxbourne Council
Service design, user research, prototyping, signage
Award-winning digital transformation for better public services
↑ The new interface focuses in the needs of all Broxbourne residents.
Summary
A multi-disciplinary project for the Broxbourne Council (North London), to implement a digital transformation strategy across all the different departments of Local Government (Youth Services, Waste Collection, Citizen Services, etc.).
🏆 This team effort won the Best Public Sector Project category at the Digital Technology Leaders Awards (DTLA) in 2021.
32%
Increase in self-service interactions with Council services.
50%
Reduction in unanswered calls (overall 48% reduction in calls to the Council).
117%
Increase in residents over the age of 65 using online services.
38%
Reduction in the transferring of calls (residents get the right answers first time).
Broxbourne Borough Council serves just under 100,000 residents, but when they had to interact with their local services, whether face-to-face, online or by phone, it wasn’t as easy as it should be. The Council shared this frustration of the public and decided to start thinking of additional ways to improve.
Broxbourne residents are now welcomed into a redesigned reception area where staff are better equipped to help them in a more efficient way, and also offered self-serving technology onsite.
It has a new digital platform (Jadu Central and Jadu Connect) to support its website, digital services and system to manage the needs of residents. This has enabled 159 new digital services.
- More capable staff: trained to make the most of the new digital tools and systems. The Council has embraced new ways of working and enhanced capability, which has improved efficiency and reduced frustration and duplication of efforts at work.
- Cultural change: Departments were brought together and we redesigned the services from the residents's perspective. The project brought a customer-focused culture throughout the organisation.
- Better outcomes for residents: teams work in cohesive way, minimising the risk for gaps in services. Up to 92 query types are now resolved at first contact, and a new online account enables better self-service.
- More solid tooling: Integrations at Broxbourne currently include Capita payments, Office 365 bookings, MyAccount, Gov.notify and Whitespace waste management.
Last but not least, the Council now meets Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG 2.1 standards).
What I did
- User research
- Information architecture and navigation
- Service design
- Signage & interior design drafts
Thanks to...
Lydia Valtind (Visual Designer).
Omar Safwat (Consultant).
Tom Norman, Sally Halls (Service Design).
Stuart Park (Governance).
Francesca Barbaccia (Consultant).
Maria Fairbank-Azcarate (Consultant).
Emma Grey (Consultant).
Mohammad Khan (Consultant).
William Semple (Consultant).
Jackie Smith (Head of Consulting).
Links
It’s so exciting to see the complete change in the way that we work. The whole Council is so different to the organisation it was this time last year.
I can’t praise this transformation programme enough, particularly in our waste management services. People can now access us 24/7 online in a completely automated process. It’s fantastic.
Director of Finance at Broxbourne Borough Council.
Outcomes
Residents have a better experience because the Council staff are empowered to offer better service.
Easier to contact and interact with the Council by telephone for residents who need to do so, as well as onsite at the Council offices.
Easier maintenance
Moving to the no-code Jadu platform (CMS) meant more members of staff can update information easily and with minimal training.
Recognition
Broxbourne Council is the ‘most improved’ Local Government Council site (SiteMorse), up 365 places in the ranking from 390 to 25.
Digital capability
Four new platforms, cloud-based integrations improving legacy systems.
Culture
268 members of staff trained and supported to work digitally.
↑ User-centric and accessible: for people in Broxbourne interacting with their Council is now a lot easier than before.
I worked together with Alex to support Broxbourne Borough Council in merging together multiple, varied leisure facilities under one banner - Be.Broxbourne. We ran research sessions with users of the services, and ran co-design sessions with stakeholders to inform the direction of the new brand.
Alex’s wealth of experience as a designer ensured the success of our delivery.
Use Experience Designer at Opencast
The long read
My role in the project
1. Information architecture
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This is a work in progress
I'm currently working on completing this case study and should be available soon.
alexnogues.com 2025-26