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Digital View shares how the Digital Public Service team collaborated with the Ministry for Ethnic Communities to investigate how to improve the lived experience of digitally excluded groups in Aotearoa New Zealand.

Introduction

The report, Digital inclusion user insights — Former refugees and migrants with English as a second language, is the fourth in the series on digital inclusion commissioned by Te Tari Taiwhenua — Department of Internal Affairs (DIA). The user experience (UX) report was prepared by UX researcher Jas Hua in 2021. It focuses on the lived experience of digitally excluded groups in their initial stages of living in New Zealand.

The research was gathered through interviews with people across the country which were sourced and facilitated by Hisham Eldai, a senior community and partnerships advisor at the Ministry for Ethnic Communities (MEC). It represents the first cross-agency collaboration between DIA and MEC.

DIA published the full report and a summary report in English in late 2021. To complement its English version, the MEC have published the summary report on its website in 11 different translations. This acknowledges the breadth of languages spoken by its anonymous subjects.

Interview with Jas Hua and Hisham Eldai

In recognition of MEC publishing the translated versions of the report, and considering the condition of anonymity of its subjects, we asked Jas and Hisham about:

  • the process of creating this piece of work
  • their collaboration
  • what they learned along the way.

Here are excerpts from the interview, recorded on Zoom.

The purpose of the report

Video 1. UX report: part 1
Video transcript

[Visual intro title page:]

  • Te Tari Taiwhenua — Internal Affairs, Ministry for Ethnic Communities — Te Tari Mātāwaka
  • Digital inclusion user insights — Former refugees and migrants with English as a second language
  • Part 1 — The purpose of the report

[Visual:] Jas Hua, UX researcher, Digital Inclusion, Digital Public Service, Te Tari Taiwhenua — DIA


[Audio:] Hi, everyone. I am Jas and I work as a UX researcher for the digital inclusion team at DIA.


[Visual:] Hisham Eldai, Senior Community and Partnerships Advisor, Ministry for Ethnic Communities


[Audio:] I’m Hisham Eldai, a senior community and partnerships advisor in the Ministry for Ethnic Communities.


[Visual: Jas Hua]


[Audio:] For me, my passion lies in understanding humans in general, but also specifically to understand what makes them unique — the barriers, the pain points that they face for any specific issues.


[Visual:] Hisham Eldai


[Audio:] I have been really passionate about getting the voices of our communities heard. I know many of them are doing a lot of initiatives to improve their understanding of the New Zealand government systems, and they are accessing the Digital Public Service.

And so when Jas came along and she said she wanted to do research on understanding user journeys, particularly for the segment of the community that’s at the biggest risk of digital exclusion, I was like, okay, that’s the right opportunity. And so we teamed up together.


[Visual:] Jas Hua


[Audio:] For me, I loved it in a way because it allowed me to explore and understand deeper the lived experience and the story of this group.


[Visual:] Hisham Eldai


[Audio:] It was really one of the best projects I have done because my passion for the communities, my passion for the digital world, getting to work across different departments and this sort of collaboration, it was totally exciting and seeing the impact of it on the community, of course. Yeah.


[Visual close out:]

  • Te Tari Taiwhenua — Internal Affairs, Ministry for Ethnic Communities — Te Tari Mātāwaka
  • digital.govt.nz

We have seen the impact of COVID-19 on disconnecting people from each other — meaning people who were not digitally capable would also be excluded in the digital world.

So we know there’s a continuum between the digital world and the real world. And I have been really passionate about getting the voices of our communities heard.

So when Jas came along and she said like she wanted to do her research on understanding user journeys, particularly for this segment of the community that are at the biggest risk of digital exclusion, I knew it was the right opportunity.

Hisham Eldai, MEC

For me, my passion lies in understanding humans in general, but also specifically to understand what makes them unique. The barriers, the pain points that they face for any specific issues.

Specifically to this research, I wanted to understand what was the current digital inclusion position or status of these communities. I wanted to understand the first 3 months when they first came to New Zealand. What was that digital inclusion state? And then I want to understand the first 3 years of their settlement journey and being able to analyse and see the progression of changes in terms of digital inclusion, if there is any.

Jas Hua, DIA

Cross-agency collaboration

Video 2. UX report: part 2
Video transcript

[Visual intro title pages:]

  • Te Tari Taiwhenua — Internal Affairs, Ministry for Ethnic Communities — Te Tari Mātāwaka
  • Digital inclusion user insights — Former refugees and migrants with English as a second language
  • Part 2 — Cross-agency collaboration

[Visual:] Jas Hua, UX researcher, Digital Inclusion, Digital Public Service, Te Tari Taiwhenua — DIA


[Audio:] So for me, how our work intersects between me and Hisham is that for me, I represent the digital inclusion team at DIA and Hisham represents the connection to communities from Ministry for Ethnic Communities point of view.

And so together we collaborate in terms of research questions with brainstorming on what’s the right thing to ask here. And Hisham also helped me to recruit research participants based on the criteria that we set out.


[Visual:] Hisham Eldai, Senior Community and Partnerships Advisor, Ministry for Ethnic Communities


[Audio:] It was really a learning journey and we solved a lot of it, just more importantly, giving communities who were taking part in this research the opportunity to highlight the work that they’re doing was totally worthwhile.

And I guess this project is one milestone in this journey and I can see us working together towards achieving stronger outcomes that connect the voices of our communities, ethnic communities in New Zealand.


[Visual close out pages:]

  • Te Tari Taiwhenua — Internal Affairs, Ministry for Ethnic Communities — Te Tari Mātāwaka
  • digital.govt.nz

Hisham has a network with other advisors in the country, who have links to other non-profit organisations and communities. And from there, pretty much we reached out to recruit participants. Usually the hardest part of a research project is to find the right people for the research.
Jas Hua, DIA
The challenge was to quickly build up a team of advisors from the ministry [MEC] throughout the country and then connect them to the research question and use their excellent community relationships in bringing in research participants within the deadlines, within the timeframes that we had for the research. And it’s really worked quite well.
Hisham Eldai, MEC

Learnings

Key takeaways from the research reflect the common need for inclusion in how government works with digitally excluded groups in Aotearoa New Zealand.

Video 3. UX report: part 3
Video transcript

[Visual intro title pages:]

  • Te Tari Taiwhenua — Internal Affairs, Ministry for Ethnic Communities — Te Tari Mātāwaka
  • Digital inclusion user insights — Former refugees and migrants with English as a second language
  • Part 3 — Learnings

[Visual:]

Jas Hua, UX researcher, Digital Inclusion, Digital Public Service, Te Tari Taiwhenua — DIA


[Audio:] For me as a researcher, probably the biggest thing that I learned with this project is to absolutely keep an open mind when we do any piece of work.

The other thing is to have empathy and to be really fully aware of the situation and the challenges that people face in their life. And to really have a strong respect for what people are going through.


[Visual:] Hisham Eldai, Senior Community and Partnerships Advisor, Ministry for Ethnic Communities


[Audio:] Some of the biggest learnings is in connecting to the human side, the human consequences of the algorithm is you’ve got to be really inclusive. You’ve got to maybe have human oversight. And that means you need to have a very strong understanding of the system that you’re modelling and also very strong understanding of the shortcomings of that system.


[Visual:] Publishing the report


[Visual:] Jas Hua


[Audio:] One of our principles is that we want to be inclusive in the way that we share the findings, so to publish the report in the languages that the research participants speak is something that we want to do for inclusion.


[Visual:] Hisham Eldai


[Audio:] Hosting it on the ministry's website serves the purpose of making the report reachable and accessible to the community in the various different languages, and also to the support organisations and NGOs working in the space of improving digital inclusion.

And hosting it of course, on the digital website makes the report part of the consistent practice of all the other reports, where decision makers can access the website and take the learnings, take their perspectives, and compare these findings to the other findings across the other research groups.


[Visual:] Jas Hua


[Audio:] This is a very humbling experience for me to, you know, spend some time with the communities and to see that the communities are very strong and very resilient despite the challenges that they face in life. And so I feel super, super grateful and humbled to be part of this research project.


[Visual close out:]

  • Te Tari Taiwhenua — Internal Affairs, Ministry for Ethnic Communities — Te Tari Mātāwaka
  • digital.govt.nz

The nature of the problem we’re dealing with, there was probably no one solution fits all, no best practice.

It was quite ambiguous and the road was not clear. We had to really take steady steps and apply various sorts of solutions.

Hisham Eldai, MEC

Doing this piece of research has changed my life for the better. It’s also an example and a reminder of why I work in public services because the goal of the research is to help surface the voice of all these often digitally excluded communities.

For me, this was a collaboration between the government and community. You know, it’s coming together and achieving something that is better for the community, which is in this case, surfacing their voice.

Jas Hua, DIA

Inclusive algorithms

When you’re someone who designs algorithms, you worry about efficiency of the algorithm. You worry about it using the resources, the computational resources, the processing power and if it can run on different computers without breaking apart. And then its impact on the real world like, for example, if you’re running a classification algorithm, you’ll just measure the impact in terms of its ability to return [with] accuracy and sensitivity.

So any deviation in accuracy from 100%, that little collateral is [a] ‘cost’. You’re going to be able to say, okay, we can neglect that. However, when you look at that 1 or 2% where the algorithm misses out on for an algorithm that is for hiring or probation systems or that assigns hospital appointments, then there’s a real human cost. There are real people’s fates waiting to be judged by the algorithm.

So some of the biggest learnings is in connecting to the human consequences of the algorithm. You’ve got to maybe have human oversight. And that means you need to have a very strong understanding of the system that you’re modelling and very strong understanding of the shortcomings of that system — and how they translate in the world as a first order, second order, intended or unintended consequence.

Hisham Eldai, MEC

Publishing the report

The participants we did the research with are from 20 ethnicities and they speak in 11 different languages.

One of our principles is that we want to be inclusive in the way that we share the findings.

So to publish the report in the languages that the research participants speak is something that we want to do for inclusion.

Jas Hua, DIA
It also shows that we have heard their voices.

We are hosting it on the Ministry for Ethnic Communities website, which they trust, and they connect with. Also, to the support organisations and NGOs working in the space of improving digital inclusion.

It’s important, also, to host the report on digital.govt.nz alongside the other digital inclusion reports, where decision makers can access the website and take the learnings, take their perspectives, and compare this finding to the other findings across the other research groups.

And so we’re doing a bridging task between the decision makers and the communities — sharing the community’s response and scaling that up to the decision makers. We see both websites as a continuum of each other when it comes to delivering on the impact of this report.
Hisham Eldai, MEC

Hopes for the future

I have many hopes for digital technology, transformational technology and the impact that has on communities. Traditionally, minority communities might have been used by the big players as a product rather than an integral part of the design.

So in terms of my dreams for the community, getting their voice heard and understanding that being able to connect and access services in the digital world as well as the physical world is part of why we are here as a ministry [MEC]. And so those action plans, of course, should really accommodate achieving outcomes for the communities both in the physical world and as well as in the digital world.

Hisham Eldai, MEC

In terms of what I hope this report can achieve or influence government is [that] they consider the elements that are common across humans for all of these groups, so when we shape any digital inclusion initiative, then we address specific needs for those communities.

Reading the report would help you in a way to gain empathy or to be able to see what it’s like for different groups when they face digital inclusion issues.

Jas Hua, DIA

Find out more

Find out more about the full and summary reports and research into digitial inclusion:

View the 11 translations of the summary report on the Ministry for Ethnic Communities website:

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