New tool for fighting financial hardship, awards excitement, the Service Design Standard simplified and ICAgile certification.

View in browser

Share newsletter

     
boost_b

Boost. The power of positive impact

11 August 2020

The Good News issue

With all that’s going on in 2020, it’s nice to have some good news to share:

  • The government’s Digital Service Design Standard gets a wee bit simpler
  • Virtual Agile training goes “above and beyond”
  • We’re going for gold at the Welly awards
  • A new tool is helping to fight financial hardship
Stylised figures at work on a project aiming to follow the New Zealand Government Digital Service Design Standard.

Government Digital Service Design Standard simplified

New Zealand government agencies are expected to follow the government’s Digital Service Design Standard when providing new or improved digital services.

The service design approach focuses on making government services easy for people to use, by putting the users at the centre of the process.

As with any process, there’s a bit to get to grips with when you start. So to make it easier for state agencies to follow the Standard, we’ve put together a series of practical tips based on our experience helping the public sector deliver digital services that create positive and lasting impacts for the people of New Zealand.

Get a simple guide to the Standard

Screenshot of the Stuff article on the Wellington Gold awards.

Going for Gold at the Welly Awards

2020 Wellington Gold finalists badge

We’re really proud to join an amazing bunch of high-achievers as finalists in the Wellington Gold Awards.

It’s the second year in a row we’ve been finalists, after we won the Team Gold award last year.

This year, we’re up for an award for the way we’re putting our Values at the heart of our operation, and how this work has enabled us to:

  • achieve our highest ever Team Happiness rating
  • survive and thrive during the COVID-19 crisis
  • grow and deliver greater benefits to our clients.

If you’re interested in getting similar results in your workplace, this case study shows why and how we’re doing this.

'Remarkable' businesses among 2020 Wellington Gold Awards finalists — Stuff

 

Some of the goodies in the APF welcome pack

Part of the Agile Professional Foundation welcome pack

“Brilliant” new virtual Agile training

As we tailored our Agile Professional Foundation for online delivery, we needed to get the redesigned course certified by the International Consortium for Agile (ICAgile).

The certification process has been a nice validation of the hard work our Agile team have put into the new course.

“Brilliant” and “you’ve gone above and beyond” were just a couple of the comments from the ICAgile assessor.

The resulting course is an interactive workshop running over four mornings (NZ time).

It starts with the Agile mindset — a way of working that drives continuous improvement — then moves onto practical ways to put Agile into action.

In the four modules you’ll cover:

  1. Understanding the Agile Mindset
  2. Frameworks and Roles
  3. Creating a Strong Culture
  4. Planning and Executing

The next course runs 19–22 October.

Learn more or book now

Rocky Webster

FinCap product owner Rocky Webster

Leading the fight against financial hardship

FinCap’s next-generation Client Voices application has gone live and is already making a difference. Client Voices is a custom-built client-management, budgeting and reporting tool that lets financial mentors from around New Zealand help their clients avoid financial hardship.

“Client Voices is a client-management system for budgeting services. It has traditional budgeting tools, like a budget worksheet, cash flow, debt schedule, to record the client's financial situation and help them become more financially capable,” says the Product Owner on the project Rocky Webster. “Then there's the reporting aspect.”

Designed to amplify the impact of Client Voices, the reporting tools:

  • guide improvements in the application and the budgeting services it supports
  • gather data on the drivers of financial hardship to guide policy making
  • help budgeting services attract funding to increase the reach of their services.

Feedback from the budgeting services that use Client Voices shows that it’s hitting the mark.

“OMG Rocky, I’m already in love with the new system. Just got asked how many whanau we support. Perfect timing and I’ll probably get the funding because I could answer the question.”
— Budgeting service manager

“I think we've secured the ability to see the impact of financial hardship in New Zealand, probably for the next 10 years at least,” Rocky says.

Learn more about FinCap’s fight against financial hardship  →

Our next Agile Professional Foundation runs on 19–22 October
Get the skills to deliver more value, faster.

Sign up now

Boost%20B%20Footer

Boost Level 5, 57-59 Courtenay Place

Te Aro Wellington 6011 New Zealand

boost.co.nz   |    info@boost.co.nz   |    +64 4 939 0062

Share

       

Did a friend send you this? Subscribe here

Want more ways to increase your impact? Read recent issues

Unsubscribe