Shelagh Bennett

The Public Policy Lab's mission is to design services that help Americans build better lives. We partner with government agencies – and the communities they serve – to create public services that are more effective, more respectful, and simple to use. Public programs are how our society invests in citizens. Too often, however, public services don’t feel very friendly, or even very useful. Here at the Public Policy Lab, we think the solution lies with the people themselves: when services are thoughtfully designed to serve the needs of their users, to be engaging and easy to use, then they’re more satisfying for citizens, as well as more effective and cost-efficient for government. We engage in research at the intersection of policy and user-centered design. We examine how policy goals and public services can be assessed through the experience of their users. We identify best practices from the design professions that can bring value to the public sector. And then we directly engage with government leaders and community members in projects to improve service delivery.