Methods and tools used in the Houten pilot
The approach was to instigate a better and joined understanding of the needs and challenges. To help understand the citizens the pilot used the community reporting method that captured citizens’ voices and their narratives of lived experiences. Additionally, to have fruitful dialogues between professionals and citizens a conversation of change was organised in a format of reflective learning or so-called Living Lab using processed user story data and symbolic pictures to trigger conversations about solutions and challenge ingrained perceptions.
The voices were analysed and important topics have been distilled to work on further:
- Take peoples ‘basic needs’ in consideration.
- Support people during the transition phase between social benefits and a regular income (a phase citizens describe as a ‘twilight zone’).
- Focus on peoples ‘motivation’ to find a sustainable match.
- Help people to understand ‘systemic and regulatory problems’.
- Support ‘a good and personal match’ between job seekers and employers (instead of the usual vacancy descriptions and job interviews).
- ‘Support for job seekers and employers to realize a good match’.
The pilot even organized special co-creation sessions with citizens focusing on finding solutions for obstructive factors people face during their re-integration to the labour market.