Citizen OS — Participatory decision-making platform

UX/UI

NGO

Democracy

Discussion

Voting

Ideation

Citizen OS ^'2024

8 years after the first Citizen OS platform went live, the new & improved version has been launched. A platform that encourages participatory decision-making, it has a lot of functionality available for communities, organisations and governmental bodies to include everyone and make democratic decisions. Gathering ideas, having a discussion where participants share pro and con arguments, casting votes… These features and more each came with their own specific design challenges and, through iteration and user testing, were refined to both suit the user’s needs and the business’ requirements.

Goals & Challenges

Making a platform that holds all the (complex) digital tools to have a democratic decision-making process while also making it accessible and easy to use.

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Citizen OS platform

Massive make-over

Since the previous version of Citizen Os’s platform had been live and in use for several years already, which offered us a lot of feedback and insights into the needs and challenges the users were having.

With all the feedback gathered we set out to create a new UX & UI solution, built from the ground up, all based on defined design principles. Going through several iterations allowed us to have continuous user testing from which the findings could immediately be implemented. On top of the UX improvements we also created an update to the visual design which is softer and friendlier.

Topics & Phases

A topic consists of different phases which, by going through them, will help the participants work towards a democratic decision. The phases are in a linear order: Idea gathering, pro/con discussion, voting and action. The creator of the topic can decide when a different phase gets added and in this way guides the process forward.

Each phase has its own unique way of how the participant engages with it. Whether it's sharing an idea, posting a (pro/con) argument or casting a vote, the participant always knows what to focus on.

Groups

Groups in Citizen OS serve a double purpose. The first is to bring people together under one banner. It creates a feeling of community and belonging. Secondly, entire groups can be invited to a topic, which would give all the group members immediate access to it. This way it’s really easy to have specific topics that are only available to members of the groups.

Make it clear & engaging

Because the platform in itself has a lot of features, it’s easy to get confused or lost. So we wanted to make sure that the admin or the participant always has a clear understanding of what they can or should do next. Whether it’s through a walkthrough tour, helpful instructions or smart notifications, the new platform attempts to remove as much confusion as possible.

Additionally engaging stats, colours and prompts engage the participants more effectively, while the admin has additional tools to nudge them into sharing their ideas, or submit their vote.