I am looking forward though, because at least for now it opens up the discussion on the fidelity of prototypes.

Prototyping with Figma Make for 2 weeks now – it’s certainly gonna change a lot, but I am still not sure in which direction. Product People love it because it suggests the prototype can be done by a machine when in fact we designers need to clean up the hallucinations afterwards.

Stop focusing on reducing clicks.

Start focusing on making content clear.

p.s. reducing clicks may be the result of good design, but it’s not the goal in and of itself.

Stop counting clicks!

“But that’s a lot of clicks”

I hear this from stakeholders (and even UI/UX designers) quite regularly when I share flows with multiple steps.

But here’s the truth:

Users don’t care about clicks, as long as each click takes them logically towards their goal.

The real problem is...

Interesting paper! When you ask people about the most important issue "facing the country," they often say immigration. But when you ask them about issues facing them personally, it doesn't crack the top 10.

This indicates that voters are reacting to media narratives, not their own experience.

I've been thinking about this the past years. It never ever occured to me that interview participants complaint about a form being too long. They were just afraid of making a mistake in a government form. Is this what you mean with pause time?

3 laws of form design

For the last 20+ years, I’ve built and designed various products and services that are full of forms.

And most of them had a lot of UX and accessibility issues.

But I realised that every solution I’ve ever come up with to address these issues can be traced back to 3 simple laws...

Warum wir selbst Expert:innen sein müssen, um Formulare zu digitalisieren | DigitalService 06. August 2025 - Formulare digitalisieren ist ein kom­plexer Prozess, der ein tiefes Verständnis der Thematik braucht. Anhand eines realen Online-Formu­lars zeigen wir, warum Digitalisierung keine Fl...

I often get asked why digitalization takes so long. Acquiring domain knowledge is a big factor. On the @digitalservice.bund.de blog @jonowak.eu and I explain why we have to acquire so much expertise in the first place.
digitalservice.bund.de/blog/warum-w...

Warum wir selbst Expert:innen sein müssen, um Formulare zu digitalisieren | DigitalService 06. August 2025 - Formulare digitalisieren ist ein kom­plexer Prozess, der ein tiefes Verständnis der Thematik braucht. Anhand eines realen Online-Formu­lars zeigen wir, warum Digitalisierung keine Fl...

“For example, up to 90% of all written applications for legal aid are incomplete or filled out incorrectly. The situation is similar for other administrative and judicial forms.”

My colleagues @jonowak.eu and @paulpistorius.bsky.social share why they had to become domain experts to digitalise forms

User-Research professionalisieren: unser Weg im DigitalService | DigitalService 10. Juni 2025 - <span lang="en">User-Research</span> wirkt: Wir zeigen, wie wir Nutzenden­for­schung im DigitalService etabliert haben – mit klaren Zielen, messbaren Erfolgen und einem Blick nach vorn...

How we professionalise #UserResearch at @digitalservice.bund.de:

My colleagues Sonja and Anja blogged about our journey in the past 2 years and on what’s next — digitalservice.bund.de/blog/user-re...

I'm very happy my talk from this years int’l #GovDesign Conference in Amsterdam is now available on YouTube!

YouTube video by Digital Service Network International Work on Human Centered Form Design

It’s because of who is in the room when the forms are designed. And who is not.

My @digitalservice.bund.de colleagues @paulpistorius.bsky.social and Julian Rösner discussed this at Code for America’s #FormFest: how the right parties involved form a triangle of success.

youtu.be/th9iNKBmGe0?...

Joining the #UserNeedsFirst #GovDesign conference in Amsterdam for the next 3 days and I hope to meet lots of international colleagues! On Thursday afternoon I'll talk about the "Triangle of success" – why it's important to involve the right parties in the form design process.

Thinking about why public services should
not be designed in the same way as private-sector ones. I've 5 points so far:
(1) CHOICE: with v few exceptions, we get to choose the private-sector digital services we use but most public services need to be universal at the point of access
(1/n)

Ich sag’ es mal so: Es gibt Fotos, auf denen der Tatverdächtige von Mannheim gemeinsam mit Abgeordneten der AfD bei rechten Aufmärschen zu sehen ist. Der Weg von rechtem Terror zur AfD ist zufälligerweise nie weit. Aber weil der Täter kein Ausländer war, gibt es leider keine Debatte.

Left: form with asterisks. Right: form with optional fields highlighted with text

“Should you mark required fields with a red asterisk?”

In 2008 I worked on a bunch of e-commerce sites like Boots, Argos and Homebase.

We marked required fields with a little red asterisk.

It’s clean.

It’s conventional.

It’s what everyone else did.

But we never ran usability tests...

One of the biggest barriers to digital service transformation is budget separation.

It’s a cost item on a digital budget.

Which later results in savings in the service operation budget.

That’s a different team, unit or even organisation.

1/X

Also I wonder why they chose to go with very very dry/boring branding (or rather no branding?). Citizens appreciate modern and fresh UI as long as it's not looking like a private offer.

And as @martinjordan.com pointed out: if it's supposed to show a vision, why then not visualize how a proactive administration would feel like?

Especially after the fiasco of the Kindergrundsicherung the @gruene.de should know that empty promises create nothing than frustration.

It's a bit disappointing to see an app from a political party instead of actionable administration reforms – that would ultimately enable such an app.

Services become ossified and fragile because 'the programme' is the only mental model for change.

We need new models that encourage public servants to embrace continuous adaptation aged improvement of public services.

It's generally not outdated technology that stymies simpler, cheaper and more empathetic public services.

It's outdated culture, processes and operating models.

Thank's for sharing @cjforms.bsky.social! I did a quick summary of the talk in the thread below for folks with a shorter attention span bsky.app/profile/paul...

YouTube video by Digital Service Network International Work on Human Centered Form Design

You can now watch the recording of our talk on YouTube youtu.be/th9iNKBmGe0?...

Whoever does this, whether it's researchers, designers or product managers, it's crucial to identify all the stakeholders, understand the requirements and connect those insights.

As form designers we're in a unique position to connect the dots – this is where the magic happens. And form design is a team effort.

How do we figure this out? First we need to talk to all the parties and learn about their needs and requirements. Depending on the context, there may be several stakeholders in each party. Learning about all their requirements is crucial.

Why? Because improving the usability of a form is often not enough. We should rather figure out which questions need to be asked in the first place.

Graphic of a triangle. Each corner says "Form users", "Form owners" or "Form processors".

A few weeks ago we talked at #FormFest about why it is important to include all stakeholders into the form design process. We call it the triangle of success. Details in thread.