Let’s talk about sex and gender

About this Case Study

Does your service need to ask about someone’s sex and/or gender?

We'll talk about designing a service that meets the needs of transgender and non-binary people, ensuring they feel safe and respected when applying for a criminal record check and how we’ve been working with government and third-sector organisations from across the UK to examine the evidence base for asking questions on sex and/or gender.

We’ll cover the approach taken, what we learned and share techniques used to remove bias from research and analysis. We’ll also share the success of how this work led to the removal of the gender question from our forms.

About the Speakers

Stephanie Holland

Stephanie's worked for Disclosure Scotland, a Scottish Government agency, for almost 14 years. Having moved from operational delivery to the transformation programme, she embraced an opportunity to train as a user researcher through experienced-based learning. This resulted in Stephanie becoming the organisation's first user researcher.

She's always had a passion for doing the right thing for citizens and is a vocal advocate for staff and user needs. She also works with others to make a difference to 'care experienced' children and young people's lives via her role as a Children's Panel member.

Stephanie's deep understanding and expert knowledge of Disclosure Scotland, combined with her professional and personal experience of being a panel member, has helped embed a user-centred design culture within the organisation.

 @HollandSteph_

Jane Reid

Jane’s been the lead user researcher (contractor) at Disclosure Scotland, a Scottish Government agency, since March 2017.

Pioneering user research in Disclosure Scotland, she’s embedded the discipline in the organisation with their commitment to permanent user research staff working in an agile, multi-disciplinary team.

Before this, Jane spent 4 years as a user researcher at DWP working in the Universal Credit digital team in London. She then took up a secondment as Design Research Manager at Scottish Enterprise. However, she believes she’s been doing user research, and working with others to design better services, for over 20 years - before job titles, technology and management buy-in were mature enough to be able to make a real difference.

Her expertise lies in researching the needs of users with multiple problems in their lives, such as homelessness, drugs, alcohol, bereavement, caring issues, inter-generational unemployment and domestic abuse. As a great believer in not just sharing insights with people but really working together to solve problems that cut across other services, Jane’s an expert in bringing agencies together to collaborate and improve local services.

 @janereid73