This week we published ‘Launching trio writing book at Eisteddfod’ which highlights our presence at the National Eisteddfod of Wales this year, and ‘Understanding the problems taxi passengers face through user research’ where our user research team explains how they are conducting user research to understand what problems exist when using taxi and private hire vehicles.
I’ve been working on a practical guide to help us govern our website in the future. It aims to make our processes clear to people who own the content (facts) on the website and those who communicate it (clear words). It talks about things like:
At the start of this week, I spoke to Alun (the website’s product manager) and identified and filled some gaps. But with a few tweaks, we think it’s worthy of an MVP - a testable version.
It’s a practical guide, written online that will be a living thing. The website's product team will be the guardians of this in the future. However, I want people to search for its topcis, find it, refer to it, use it and suggest ways to improve it.
Governance seems dry, but it affects the decisions we make every day, so it’s too important to be a ticked box. That’s why it’s not a dry document. Documents often get assigned to a single person, or a panel, to review periodically. Then nobody reads them. Then they get forgotten. I’m hoping it gives us enough of a steer to make good, reasoned decisions but also be responsive enough to change when we need to.
The website doesn’t live in isolation. It’s closely linked to the work of the CRM team. It’s key to delivering our services and communicating our work. Content and communications expertise are both important parts of the publishing processes to make sure that we meet the needs of our users. This is all covered in there.
I’m going to test this guide with a few internal users for some feedback. This might tell us how we can improve it in the future and how people want to find this information.
Shwmae bawb, Alaw sy’ ‘ma!
Since starting my new role only two weeks ago, I was quite nervous in terms of the considerations needed when making posts accessible. Josh planned on showing me the ropes, and in all honesty, as much as I was aware I had a lot to learn, I wasn’t expecting such an eye opening meeting!
Josh directed me towards websites and apps that could help, majority being those to support with colour accessibility for colour blind people. I could test different colours against each other and see what people with all different types of this condition could / couldn’t see - amazing!
We went through examples of social posts, and Josh talked through all my rights and wrongs. I’ve always added ALT text in both Welsh and English. Coming from a translator role, everything has to be bilingual, and rightly so! But, Josh explained this is an exception. When a screen reader speaks the ALT text for a person, it can’t always comprehend the Welsh, resulting in it speaking gibberish! Similar to the Google translate robot when asking them to announce the Welsh, you’ll never understand it! So, where possible, I will add the ALT text in English only. But, that’s a point on Welsh language accessibility, something that must be looked into.
This meeting with Josh was one of the most insightful and valuable meetings I’ve had over my year here at CDPS. I’m lucky to be in this position where I’m learning from the very best!