When a refugee at the Nakivale refugee camp in Uganda goes to a water point to fill up a jerry can with water, someone in a bright yellow shirt will walk up with a tablet and ask them to swipe left or right to a smiley face: Were they satisfied with the process of getting water? Then they’ll ask if the refugee has any ideas to make it better.
A customer service team now asks the same two questions throughout the camp–about everything from healthcare and nutrition to shelter–collecting feedback that can be shared in real time with camp management and the Minneapolis headquarters of Alight (formerly the American Refugee Committee), the organization that runs the camp, so that services can improve.
“It’s shifting from the idea of a refugee as a beneficiary of services to really a customer, and someone that you’re providing the best services that you can for,” says Adam Reineck, global design director at Ideo.org, the nonprofit arm of the design firm Ideo, which worked with the American Refugee Committee to create the new system of customer feedback, called Kuja Kuja.
