A statewide citizen satisfaction survey on public services

What is shaping government

Government departments, PSUs and public programmes need independent evidence on citizen needs, service delivery and programme outcomes, often gathered across large and diverse geographies.

• Programmes are expected to show measurable outcomes
• Citizen feedback is shaping service delivery
• Large field surveys need rigorous quality control

A state planning department, working in A large state in North India. Client identity is withheld to protect confidentiality.

Organisation

A state planning department

Sector

Government

Team engaged

IT & Development

Services

Government research, Offline data collection (CAPI), Data analytics & dashboards

The department wanted independent evidence on how citizens experienced health, education, ration distribution, roads and electricity, to guide budget priorities. Previous surveys had covered only a few districts, so officials could not compare performance across the state.

• Deliver on the brief: a statewide citizen satisfaction survey on public services.
• Design around the real needs of households.
• Define requirements and success criteria the solution would be tested against.
• Deliver a reliable, secure solution the team can run and extend.

The work focused on 15,000 households.

• households15,000

Audiences we typically reach in government

Citizens and householdsProgramme beneficiariesFrontline workersLocal officialsBusinesses using public services

Coverage: A large state in North India. Market: India.

• India

An iterative delivery approach: discovery, design, build and test in short cycles, with the client reviewing each step.

1. 1Brief
2. 2Household survey
3. 3District dashboards
4. 4Insight

We designed a multi-stage household sample covering every district, trained local-language interviewers and used tablets with GPS and time stamps. Results were weighted to population and shown on district dashboards. Back-checks were carried out on a random sample of interviews, and results were shared with district officials in workshops so they could understand and use the findings.

Government researchOffline data collection (CAPI)Data analytics & dashboards

households

15,000

• Users and stakeholders from every affected team took part in discovery workshops and acceptance testing.

• Requirements were gathered through workshops, process walk-throughs and a review of existing systems and data.

• Peer code review on every change
• Automated and manual testing
• User-acceptance testing with the client
• Release checklist and rollback plan

• Usage and performance monitoring after launch
• Defect and support-ticket trends
• Process time before and after

• Satisfaction varied widely between districts, and ration distribution and primary health centres showed the largest gaps.
• A second round was planned after eighteen months to track progress.
• A second round was planned to measure progress.

District-level evidence made priorities concrete.

• Build on the core insight: district-level evidence made priorities concrete.
• Focus effort where the evidence was strongest: satisfaction varied widely between districts, and ration distribution and primary health centres showed the largest gaps.
• Re-measure after the changes to confirm the effect.

• The department used the dashboards in district reviews.

What changed in the business as a result of the work. Impact is described qualitatively.

• Insight report and management presentation
• Cleaned data file and data tables
• Interactive dashboard
• Evaluation findings with programme recommendations
• Deployed solution with documentation and handover
• Support and maintenance plan

• Repeat the measure after changes are in place to track progress.
• A natural follow-on question: what do citizens think about a policy?