Intro

“The website is not utilized the way it should be for us. We just haven’t paid attention to the design of it. We haven’t focused on who we’re trying to reach, serving, the people in communities or even staff. I think we haven’t looked at essentials for the website serving people: accessibility, font, color, all of those elements you need for those populations we serve.” - DAAS Executive Leadership*

The San Francisco Human Services Agency (HSA) is a lifeline for 23% of San Franciscans, serving over 200,000 unique persons seeking food assistance, health care, elder care, job training, daycare, and other essential social services. Sfhsa.org serves as the proverbial front door to the agency with more than 30,000 unique visits to the website each month. The public facing website has the potential to provide information and services in a clear, helpful, effective way with the utmost dignity and respect for client experience.

Our Process

We’ve talked to HSA representatives from The Department of Aging and Adult Services (DAAS), The Office of Early Care and Education (OECE), and The Department of Human Services (DHS), including the Information Technology Department (IT), Family and Children’s Services (FCS), Internal Affairs, and Executive Leadership. We’ve engaged HSA clients and Community Based Organizations (CBOs). The overwhelming response to the current website has been:

“The website is not suiting the agency or client needs. What can we do to fix it?”*

We’ve heard honest criticism from each of the above stakeholders. “The website is dated.” “The content is all over the place.” “Nobody takes responsibility.” “It’s impossible to navigate.” Our research dug deep within the agency, analyzing the website traffic data and holding community forums at the San Francisco Public Library and at a local CBO (Arriba Juntos). We conducted comparative analysis of public agencies in the city, county, state, and beyond. Our process uncovered ideas about a future HSA website that has the potential to be an exemplar amongst public services agencies. These findings were the foundation for the document HSA Recommendations And Next Steps

Current Landscape

HSA has distinct Departments, The Department of Human Services (DHS), The Department of Aging and Adult Services (DAAS), and the Office of Early Care and Education (OECE). These Departments serve specific client populations with discrete needs. OECE’s clients may overlap with the other Departments. HSA’s public-facing website, sfhsa.org, is a funnel for all clients to find information. Beyond information, few, if any, services are provided through the website; however, links to services exist, including MyBenefits CalWIN.

Goals and Objectives

HSA’s mission is to promote well-being and self-sufficiency among individuals, families and communities in San Francisco. Information and services need to be available through clear and helpful channels in order to achieve this mission. The public-facing website is an important yet underdeveloped channel.

Why it Matters

HSA clients are as diverse as the city itself. Website accessibility is essential to accommodate this diversity. By understanding clients’ goals, challenges and needs, a streamlined client experience needs to be created. This better facilitates the agency’s goals and objectives.

Challenges

Outreach:

Engaging new clients that may need information or services provided by HSA.

Why It Matters:

Missed opportunities in serving at-risk clients in need of services.

In-Reach:

Current HSA clients are eligible for other services, but may not be aware of the options or if they qualify for them.

Why It Matters:

Clients already in the system become aware of additional resources and services that may benefit them.

Churn:

Clients are receiving services, but are dropped and then return for services.

Why It Matters:

Human or technical error should not result in a client going without services.

In-take:

Clients often seek face-to-face time or call to ask questions and understand the entire process they and their families may experience with the Agency.

Why It Matters:

HSA staffing resources are limited and an informative website can eliminate unnecessary time spent answering phone calls, emails, and reducing foot traffic to lobbies.

Not Meeting Government Mandates:

Clients who are non-native English-speakers of the City’s threshold languages or are visually or hearing impaired are not able to access sfhsa.org equally.

Why It Matters:

It upholds the law, fulfills the mission of the Agency and guarantees equity for all San Franciscans.

The Digital Divide:

Reaching clients who are older or disabled or lower-income who may not have computer or internet access.

Why it Matters:

Sfhsa.org could be a quick resource about services and lead to clients spending less time and frustration trying to access information face-to-face, over the phone, and by mail. Further, the information they receive online will be the same rather than learning disparate or incomplete information from different staff.

Digital Readiness:

Reaching clients who are older or disabled or lower-income who may not be computer or reading literate or familiar with technology tools.

Why it Matters:

Clients who are digitally literate can utilize online components of service offerings like eligibility screening and digital applications. They could stay more connected to what is happening with the HSA by following social media; and are able to take advantage of email and text notifications.

Needs

In order to fulfill HSA’s mission, the public facing website needs to be proactive with its accessibility. This includes, but is not limited to: multilingual language needs, content creation based on an audience appropriate literacy level, considerations of access to digital technology and tools (eg: mobile), digital literacy and familiarity with technology tools, and Section 508 compliance.

Internally, a cohesive content strategy needs to be in place to unify the thousands of disparate web pages on sfhsa.org. The strategy will need a sustainable approach to editing and maintaining content so that is current and uniformly accessible and simple for clients to understand and use.

More details can be found in Core Requirements For New HSA Website.

Client Needs

At a community forum held at the San Francisco Public Library and Arriba Juntos, HSA clients shared what they were currently using sfhsa.org to do:

  • General information
  • Program updates
  • Program Information
  • Check status of case and benefits
  • MyBenfits CalWIN

Data on search terms on sfhsa.org showed:

  • Five of the top ten pages visited in July 2015 related to CalFresh, including the Spanish version of the Food Stamp Fact sheets, where CalFresh can be used and eligibility requirements for the program.

There were 6,713 pages viewed on sfhsa.org related to this topic. Similar pages were also viewed.

HSA Staff Needs

At the monhly Agency Exective Staff meeting attended by Program Directors and Managers meeting, they shared what their staff was using sfhsa.org to do:

  • Learn about services available in the Agency
  • HSA Mission statement
  • Data Reports
  • Contact information
  • Notification of bidding or funding opportunities

“There are a bunch of things we haven’t thought through in ways people interact with us. One of the things is we get tons of calls to ask about people’s hours and where they are, whether their checks have been cut, their hours reported.” - Executive Leadership

The technology HSA employees have available is difficult to use (eg: RedDot, VPN). Some HSA employees recognise the value technology could have in reducing human error and thus allowing them to do their job more efficiently and effectively. However, learning and agreeing to use the existing system is uneven across the Agency.

What We Heard from HSA Employees: RedDot is difficult to use.

“The overwhelming message is that what we are using sucks (to publish information on the website / content management).” -IT Leadership

“Reddot is very difficult to understand even though they (staff) go to training; mistakes are made.” -Executive Leadership

Staff has Limited Tech Skills

“An issue is there are many Programs. The level of interest and awareness varies; skills of staff to use basic elements is very uneven.”-Executive Leadership

“We have technically limited staff. (Who) don’t know a lot of different tech platforms; adept workers, but had never heard of Doodle* (an online scheduling tool) and I was baffled by it.” -Program Leader

“I get a question every day. It’s ‘how do I print?’ Or ‘how do I get on the intranet?” -Program Staff

Fear of Change

“There are a lot of things difficult to navigate for (staff) who (are) already resistant to technology.” -Program Staff

VPN is too Restrictive

“If you access the system through your phone your access is limited… can’t access policies or connect internally to our system… it’s a huge issue to me. “-Program Staff

“I would love to see VPN go away–or not being pushed offline. I spent half of the day at home trying and I can’t get on and I have wi-fi.” -Program Staff

“(HSA Staff) have a hard time getting access outside of the building. The VPN drops off. We have access issues.We don’t have a lot of control over it “ -Program Leader

Community Based Organization (CBOs) Needs

At a community forum held at the San Francisco Public Library, 12 representatives from five different CBOs shared what they were currently using sfhsa.org to do:

  • Learn about public benefits
  • Report adult and child abuse
  • Find community resources (ie: other websites)
  • Learn about changes to contracts that might affect them
  • Keep up-to-date with resources information (eg: mybenefitcalwin.org: -applications, -status check, -recertification)
  • Look up phone numbers

Pain Points

No Dedicated Website Owner

Ideally, website content is managed by HSA individual Programs. A dedicated content owner from each team is trained, then tasked with updating and publishing content. In countless interviews we heard from leadership and staff that once a content owner leaves the role, the responsibility becomes vacant. The task defaults back to IT, who is not familiar with program content.

“The website needs to be in sync with the agency. Someone in a division takes care of the website and another person can be the point person for updates. Example: an HSA Program calls the division and says we have this going on. The point person would be the main contact to edit, update and craft the message.” –Executive Staff

“Related to (website) maintenance; staff gets trained, then they forget how to use it. We may need a new model.”- Executive Leadership

Lack of Streamlined Processes for Tech Decisions

Programs hire outside vendors to create mini-sites. More often than not, IT only becomes aware of the sites when the vendor’s contract expire, forcing IT to maintain it.

“There needs to be a better system of how we allocate tech resources. Making decisions on when to go out (to a vendor) or what to do… We have been saying that the website needs to change but there in no imperative on an Agency level… Where does this fit with what we do and how can be more effective?” -DAAS Leadership

Lack of a Digital Strategy

Organizationally, there is no cohesion in approaching content creation and messaging on the website or on social media. HSA’s vision and goals are not strongly articulated or consistent. The ad-hoc approach has resulted in a confusing client experience with varying levels of complete and current information across Programs. For social media, we discovered two ad-hoc HSA Facebook pages that included random comments and images.

What it Matters

HSA is a central resource for public assistance in the city. Sfhsa.org is the main online portal to Agency services for vulnerable clients. An ineffective, dated, broken website adds stress, frustration, and anxiety to clients already in states of distress. This can lead to a flood of calls to the Agency and foot traffic in its lobbies.