The Future of Hand Washing

Project background:

Our team was challenged to propose innovations based on behavioral design that would allow City Health Tech to expand its customer base to food service organizations (such as restaurants).

Our recommendations showed how businesses could integrate the Opal product into their daily workflow to measurably improve health & wellness outcomes for food service workers, managers, and customers.

Course:

Professor:

Duration:

Role:

Adv. Behavioral Design

Ruth Schmidt

16-Weeks

Design Researcher

Behavioral Designer

Research Method + Team Insights:

Research Method

Our research began with understanding the process of cleanliness and hand washing in the food service industry. We spoke to a freelance creative and chef to understand three core elements: Education on handwashing, Daily use/Engagement, and Evaluation and Benefit.

Through this conversation, we gained insight into the system as a whole using the 3C model. This helped us determine how to frame a solution that would best suit a food service setting.

Team insights

Within our research, we found three pain points that guided the development of our solution: Lack of motivation, Continued use, and Social Responsibility.

It was important to touch on each of those points when targeting the various roles in within the service industry: New Hires, Veteran Employees, Managers, and Customers.

Choice Posture, Choice Architecture, Choice Infrastructure diagrams

Insights from interview

Where did this lead us?:

Our research lead us to ask “How might we create a process to enforce the continued and easy use of hand-washing using the Opal Product?”

Solution:

The new process of enforcing hand-washing behavior

Each stage is based on a 3-stage flow map that was created. The colors correlate to a stage: Green is Education, Blue is Daily Use/Engagement, and Orange is Evaluation/Benefit.

Similar in design to a service blueprint we have developed a 3-stage flow map. This shows the journey each stakeholder will go on within our new hand-washing process.

This is a varitation of our 3-stage flow map, highlighting the data that can be collected by City Health Tech to better undertsand the use of their Opal Product.

3-Stage Flow Map

Data Flow Diagram

Future Implications + Considerations:

Phase 01:

6 month implementation

Phase 02:

2-3 year industry standard

The data collected from this can be shown as proof to investors and insurance agencies.

Hand Wash system can be a fully functional part of a restaurant system within 6 months.

The same process can be replicated within restaurant chains. Potentially resulting in incentivized competition between restaurant branches and more.

After receiving training, employees receive a certification.

Employee certification can be leveraged when applying for future positions within the food industry.

Certification can be applied to entire restaurants. Resulting in a similar system to that of a LEED certification.

Small Restaurants

Large Restaurants

Every restaurant is different, and experimenting with incentives based on staff desires can increase the effectiveness of the system.

Concrete and impactful changes to employees’ daily lives will go a long way.

Removing or adding certain extrinsic motivations, ex. Displaying the restaurant’s cleanliness score after hand washing.

Staying flexible is what makes customers feel safe and know the cleanliness of the establishment. While keeping the needs of employees in mind.