Hit “refresh”: Horizons’ new look and feel

Things are looking a little different around here.

After completing a major project and updating our mandate and research priorities, our next challenge was to redesign our website to help us engage with you – our users – about forward-looking research, and build foresight literacy and capacity across the public service.

We interviewed a representative sample of our users and looked at data from our old site to better understand how it’s being used. This also guided our design and communication strategy to be more user-centric.

Our redesign process allowed us to think beyond lines of code and web functionality. It gave us a chance to consider developing our corporate culture to include:

Getting comfortable with imperfection

This is the first release of our website. It will change over the coming months, as we continue user testing, work out some kinks, and incorporate your feedback.

We were tempted to postpone the site’s launch until it was nearly perfect, and maybe slap on a “Watch this space!” banner, but we saw this as a good learning opportunity to deal with discomfort and stop aiming for absolute perfection.

Sharing the process as we go (ship early, ship often)

We want to use our site to share our thinking as it unfolds, and to give you opportunities to engage with us about it.

Experimenting with different communication tactics

Talking about multiple plausible futures is hard; change can be difficult to accept, and uncertainty/ambiguity even more so. We’re looking at how our website could help us better communicate complex content. We know that experimenting means that some of our attempts will work out better than others.  

Whether you’re a frequent user of our materials or a new visitor, you’re welcome to provide us with feedback. After all, even foresight practitioners can’t anticipate all your needs!

I also encourage you to follow us on Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, or YouTube.

Great things are afoot.