Small Wins, Big Changes

Project Overview

We partnered with Catch22 to redefine progress measurement for prison leavers. By capturing subtle, meaningful indicators of growth, our co-designed tool moves beyond traditional scoring, empowering Service Users and giving Catch22 actionable, data-driven insights that align with Ministry of Justice standards. This innovative approach values incremental progress to build trust, foster agency, and support successful reintegration.

Team

This project was a collaborative effort with:

• Alomi Parikh (Ex-Product Designer)
• Aishwarya Joshi (Ex-Product Designer)
• Douwe Kruyt (Google Analyst)

Guided by Judah Armani, a multi-award-winning designer in social impact, with expertise in criminal justice and homelessness.

Project Background

Catch22 asked the Royal College of Art to help them improve their impact tool measuring the distance traveled for prison leavers.

Learnings

I learned the immense value of listening to diverse voices. By engaging stakeholders - from individuals on probation to senior management - uncovering critical user needs that often went unheard.

Process

Think back to a recent challenge you faced. Maybe you lost a loved one, or had a tough time in a relationship - think of a moment that truly tested you. Now, think about how you overcame it, and how you progressed. You know you're doing better now, but how would you prove it? How would you quantify it?

A prison sentence is usually served in 2 parts - One in prison, and the other on probation. To ensure smooth reintegration into society during probation, the Ministry of Justice contracts various organizations in areas such as Employment, Health, Finance and Wellbeing to help offenders with the transition.

One of these contracted organisations is Catch 22, who have a Personal Wellbeing Service that works towards supporting community integration and wellbeing of People on Probation. However, to secure and maintain their contract, Catch 22 must show evidence of the impact their service has on its users by quantifying the Service User's progress

Within Catch-22's Personal Wellbeing Service- Service Users answered a set of questions in their first session, giving them an initial score. In their last session, they answered the same questions to get a final score. The difference between these scores quantifies their progress.

The tool is composed of 3 categories.

We started our research with Practitioners to understand their relationship with the tool and observed a lot of friction and annoyance. While a lot of the frustrations were around the app and tech just not working, some deeper frustrations stood out for us.

SU shared their frustrations with the tool and the system in general.

These conversations helped us define our key stakeholders and understand their frustrations.

This further helped us define the key problem areas of the tool. While all of these seemed important, what stood out the most for us was the Parameters.

The question became: What does progress really look like?

if you think about it, here's what they were really saying

This is what progress should be measured by. And it's never going to look the same for everyone.

Let's go back to the recent challenge you faced. Consider the journey of overcoming that obstacle. You may have had turning points, but the real progress was in the subtle shifts. Similarly, we looked for signs. Tiny, overlooked, seemingly insignificant signs that are your daily, small wins. Because you know you can't go from 0-100 overnight. And this was the basis of our hypothesis.

We conducted a co-creation workshops with practitioners to validate this hypothesis, and Practioners shared a long list of small wins that they had noticed in their past service users. eg "He showed up for the session"

The theory was validated and we created a way to document the signs.

Tool Design

To effectively measure incremental progress for Service Users, our design approach began with crucial inquiries to define the most suitable medium, engagement level, and measurement frequency for the tool.

In a co-creation workshop with practitioners, we established that the tool would primarily operate on a laptop for quick and accurate data collection, with a paper-based alternative available for environments like prisons or probation offices where connectivity may be limited. To build trust and foster agency among Service Users, the documentation process was designed to be collaborative, with practitioners holding the final interpretive role to ensure accuracy and relevance.

So, we created our preliminary tool which allows the practitioner to document and keep track of all the micro-action that the service users were exhibiting. Consequently, they can relate each micro-action to the severity of the action, and the area of growth that it contributes to.

We looked to reshape our tool in a way that blends behavioural observations with the overall feeling of the session.To achieve this, we decided to leverage the case notes that practitioners submitted to the HMPPS website after every session. We believe this data would help practitioners score different growth categories in a single session. This iteration would thus fit seamlessly into the practitioner's existing workflow.

Our Theory of Change envisions a compassionate and informed Justice System where progress is measured in a way that respects the unique journeys of People on Probation. Through Catch22's refined tool, we aim to capture small, meaningful "Micro-Achievements" that reflect genuine growth. This approach empowers practitioners, aligns with MoJ expectations, and ultimately validates progress with data that acknowledges each individual’s path. By embedding this tool seamlessly into sessions, we foster a system that values incremental progress as indicators of long-term change, strengthening trust and transparency across all stakeholders.

Summary: This framework provides a structured way to capture, assess, and report on incremental progress. By moving from broad outcomes to specific, observable micro-behaviors, Catch 22's tool can demonstrate meaningful, data-driven progress in Service Users' reintegration journeys, meeting MoJ's standards and building a more holistic understanding of each individual's path to improvement.

While we are keen on optimising the tool for Catch 22, one of our biggest stakeholders are the MoJ, as they are the final recipients of the data generated from our tool. Therefore, our final assumption to test is whether MOJ sees this data format as a reliable means of measuring early indicators of long-term progress. To test this assumption, we reached out to a representative from MoJ to get their thoughts on a fictional report. The report showcased the number of users who have made progress, and secondly highlight the advancements achieved by SU through the service, categorised by the specific pathways and outcomes they were referred for, as well as a deep dive into how the progress is measured individually. Through this conversation, we got critical feedback validating our approach.