Building Citizen Centric Technology Products in the Government

Amit Ranjan

Presentation Flow

• ❖ My startup background
• - How I landed in the Government
• ❖ Stint at MeitY / NeGD
• - DigiLocker & OpenForge
• ❖ 10 Learnings building products inside Indian Govt
• ❖ Q & A

10 Lessons from Building Products inside the Indian Government

Silicon Valley's Secret Sauce lies at the Product - Technology Layer!

Users



Business Layer

Product / Design Layer

Technology Layer



Engineers

Very High Level of Specialization & Sophistication

Product Managers, Designers, UX Researchers, Human-Computer Interaction Designers, Ethnographers

Building Great Products requires a Combination of Art & Science!

Getting started from zero requires an instinctive / artistic flair… but scaling it massively requires a disciplined scientific approach


Today's Users expect Whatsapp level simplicity & experience!



Irrespective of whether you're a

• · Startup
• · Government
• · Corporate
Governments are good at Projects... but not necessarily Products!

Product vs. Project Mindset


You can't build high quality, modern software without high quality tools & processes!

"If I had 6 hours to chop a tree, I'd spend the first 4 sharpening my axe"

A Source Code Repository & Version Control System forms the fundamental building block or foundation in any software company


Build a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) -something that barely works & improve it iteratively

'Its very hard to envision the exact design or blueprint of the final product that'll work best… nobody has that luxury in today's fast changing world, whether in corporate, startups or governments'


Build -Measure -Learn Iterative Loops in MVP



MVP involves Rapid Prototyping, Iterative Development, Continuous User Feedback

Rationale for MVP: First Version of Product ≠ Perfect

'If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you've launched too late' Reid Hoffman, LinkedIn Founder


The Best Software Products have Integrated Stacks (Backend + Frontend)

'Design isn't just how it looks, Design also is how it works' Steve Jobs


Team Structure -Roles & Responsibilities


Parallel Labs -a Bangalore based UX firm volunteered to help improve DigiLocker!


Parallel Labs specializes in Human Centered Design Sprints….


5 Day DigiLocker Design Sprint by Parallel Labs in Dec 2019….


Rapid prototyping….


Redesigned Product Flows….




Watch on YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQypzi-e3ZA

What was the impact of the design sprint?

• ❖ Cleaner/logical UI design, app's goals are clearer
• ❖ Streamlined internal navigational flows
• ❖ Significant jump in user signup rates
• ❖ Significant jump in Aadhaar API authentication rates
• ❖ DigiLocker team upskilling
• -'Teach a man to fish, and you've fed him for a lifetime"
Product Requirement Document (PRD) & Technical Requirement Document (TRD)

• ❖ Requirements Documents are the 'running blueprint' of the product
• ❖ They build team consensus and trust while invoking buy-in from all stake holders. Should be shared with all key managers
• ❖ PRD should include product scope & concept, market analysis, use cases, assumptions, feature list, workflows & user journeys, wireframes & mockups, personas, metrics, milestones, timelines
• ❖ TRD should include technical scope, API specs, architecture diagram, technology stack, database design, security architecture, network & cloud architecture, testing plan


Daily Key Metrics Monitoring -'Pull Vs Push Psychology'

(Using email lists for quick response, ownership & transparency)

Digilocker Report

Inbox



From 'DIGILOCKER' via OpenGW

Subject New partner application for {Requester} {Beatroot Finserv Pvt Itd}

A new DigiLocker application was submitted!

Organization Name: Beatroot Finserv Pvt Itd

Partner Type: Requester

Use Case: Our product Scorel0 is a Tenant Scoring platform where we want to verify Landlord & Tenants by checking their Aadhar & PAN along Verification Process.

About: Our product ScorelO is a Tenant Scoring platform where we want to verify Landlord & Tenants by checking their Aadhar & PAN Verification Process. along

State/District: Telangana/Hyderabad

Website URL: http:/ /wwwscorelO.in

Username: beatroot

Administrator name: Narayana Swaroop

Admin mobile: 9666599913

Admin email: vns@beatroot.money


• From DIGILOCKER

Subject Digilocker Signup Report

16-01-2021,

To opengw@googlegroups.com


Managing Teamwork, Productivity & Operational Cadence

• ❖ Daily Scrum Meetings b/w tech & product team members
• ❖ Deployments -Weekly for smaller features & biweekly/monthly for longer features. As OpenForge usage matured, shifted to daily deployments using continuous integration & continuous deployments
• ❖ Cross functional meetings for root cause analysis to improve on systemic failures
• ❖ Customer support function is critical -involve them in product feedback and new feature brainstorming
• ❖ Creating sense of urgency & ownership in team is key

Let's



https://twitter.com/amitranjan

• https://twitter.com/amitranjan
• in http://in.linkedin.com/in/amitranjanprofile

Thank You

References

• ❖ https://www.parallelhq.com/case-studies/digilocker
• ❖ https://twitter.com/shawaqiii/status/1383360530153230340
• ❖ https://www.amazon.in/Zero-One-Start-Build-Future/dp/0753555190/ref=sr_1_1
• ❖ https://www.c-sharpcorner.com/article/what-is-version-control-git-vs-tfs/
• ❖ https://syntech.software/en/blog/what-minimum-viable-product-mvp-and-why-do-we-recommend-starting/