Government service design specialists, Mace & Menter, are to lead the discovery phase of a project co-funded by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG), which will look to develop a structural and fire safety reporting tool for professionals in the construction industry.
The project is led by Structural-Safety, a safety group concerned with the design, construction and use of structures. Structural-Safety is funded by the Institution of Structural Engineers, the Institution of Civil Engineers, and HSE.
Structural-Safety has been hosting an existing reporting tool since 2005. The
Confidential Reporting On Structural Safety (CROSS) system is a platform where professionals in the construction industry can report concerns and events on the safety of structures.
In 2018, Dame Judith Hackitt’s Independent Review of Building Regulations and Fire Safety, a report which was commissioned after the Grenfell Tower fire to help prevent major structural and fire disasters, recommended that CROSS should be extended and strengthened to cover all engineering safety concerns.
Mace & Menter’s team of user researchers and service designers will use a mix of qualitative and quantitative research techniques to understand how CROSS can best serve its audience; this will include a mix of workshops, depth interviews and online surveys with senior stakeholders, such as architects, engineers, fire safety experts, building managers, and all of the people who need to understand structural and fire safety.
Mace & Menter are specialists in service design and user research for complex services. The team works with organisations, including the Government Cabinet Office, DCMS, Policy Lab, Home Office, DVSA, Scope, and V&A, that want to significantly improve the way people experience their services.
Sam Menter, Mace & Menter’s Co-founder and Managing Director, said: “The work that CROSS has been doing over the last 15 years is hugely important and has the potential to save lives. Structural safety is something the most of us take for granted and it’s only when a catastrophe like Grenfell happens that you realise just how critical it is. We are excited to work with Structural-Safety and help them grow the service. We will be making it as simple and easy as possible for people to learn from reports and submit reports, so more people use the service and as many issues as
possible are submitted for review. This initial discovery piece will form the foundation of the brilliant new service.”
Simon Flanagan, Director Structural Safety Ltd, said: “We wanted to take a completely user-centred approach to the redesign of this service which meant taking a step back to understand how people are using the existing service and think about the art of the possible. We needed to know what does good really look like for our audience and where can we invest our budget so it’s going to have the biggest effect. The only way to do this is by working with our users throughout, so we engaged Mace & Menter because of their deep experience in user-centred design for public sector and their enthusiasm for helping us re-vitalise this important service. We’re excited to be creating a service that will reach more people in a more effective
way.”
For more information, go to www.macementer.com
