Intentional Design to Improve Compliance

Challenge:

In collaboration with Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED), NRCan identified significant challenges and friction points in the permit acquisition and compliance process for mining companies. The process was redundant, time-consuming, complex, confusing, and sometimes seemed to be contradictory.

NRC wanted to find a way to make the permit acquisition and compliance process simpler and more intuitive, reducing the burden on the mining sector and improving compliance. ISED saw this initiative as a pilot for a larger effort to simplify the time and effort required to meet regulatory requirements.

Services Provided:

Jumping Elephants was engaged to support NRCan in designing and validating a new tool that would simplify the permitting process for the mining industry. The specific services included:

  1. A comparative analysis of 5 similar platforms to identify the best practices of navigation tools in general

  2. A series of stakeholder and industry interviews to gather deeper insight on the project, the vision, and how it aligns with the real needs of potential users. The interviews were structured, and a findings report was delivered

  3. Based on the insight and recommendations gathered from the stakeholder interviews, industry interviews, and comparative analysis, sketches of wireframes were created to help brainstorm ideas related to the layout and functionalities of the tool. The best ideas were selected, and a series of high-fidelity wireframes were created to demonstrate these ideas in detail

  4. Remote, moderated usability tests were conducted with representatives from the mining sector to evaluate the effectiveness of the wireframes

Results:

The evidence-based approach generated several important insights that were then incorporated into the final information architecture and solution design. The new concept walked users through a series of key questions that would then generate a clear, short list of the regulatory information they would require to be compliant with federal requirements.