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Delivering training books, mandatory handouts and policy pamphlets to employees can result in eye rolls, groans and procrastination. Required and routine information often gets lost amid the many more immediate issues demanding our attention each day. At Throughline, we transform the employee experience to create appealing, memorable and straightforward interactions to deliver the information critical to their daily work. We do this by reimagining communications through a user experience that goes beyond words alone.
Our clients seek new user experiences that also optimize business outcomes, maintain simplicity, and create stronger synchronization between teams, stakeholders and consumers. Throughline delivers this by transforming written documents into visual toolkits and interactive designs customized to the client’s environment. Early last year, Guidehouse sought our approach to deliver impact for the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) as it improved its Unemployment Insurance (UI) Equitable Access across the country.
Across America, states handling Unemployment Compensation faced a similar challenge when it came to promoting equitable access to their programs: how to streamline the explanations for leading practices, common recommendations and insights to maximize understanding and impact. DOL received and dedicated funding to address that challenge and improve their critical Unemployment Compensation Programs. After client interviews, collaborative sessions and iteration cycles, our efforts culminated in a final product titled the Unemployment Insurance Equitable Access Toolkit. The Toolkit is an easily shareable, interactive PDF that takes a visual approach to educating state UI agencies on leading practices in 10 different subject areas.
Visually, the Toolkit uses a building format with 10 floors, each focusing on different issues the states face and visual artifacts that represent the subject areas. The information and sub-topics provide readers with tools and resources, step-by-step instructions, key takeaways, laws and regulations and more. By harnessing a familiar, ubiquitous visual metaphor, users more easily understand and retain otherwise dense information that can feel daunting to grasp through text alone.
Policy information and training guides don’t have to be lengthy documents gathering dust on the shelf. Next time you’re faced with socializing key information across your team or organization, consider the power of working visually. Not only is it proven to increase retention and engagement, but visuals streamline tedious, intimidating text into something user-friendly and approachable. With clarity comes greater common understanding—and a stronger foundation upon which your team can build success.
Do you have key information that needs to come to life? Reach out! We’re always excited for a challenge.
‘Til next time,
Alex Dean, Associate Content Strategist