A presentation at World IA Day London 2026 in in London, UK by London World IA Day
The meaning of public services Duncan Stephen, Lead Content Designer (structured content and information architecture) at The Scottish Government. London 2026 #Designing4Meaning #wiad26
Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 2
Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 3
The perspective of service design
Verb-based perspective Lou Downe (2015) Good services are verbs, bad services are nouns Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 5
The perspective of information architecture
Noun-based perspective Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 7
Meaningful building blocks of services
“Turning nouns into verbs” “After several rounds of user testing, the Home Office changed the name of ‘Immigration Health Surcharge’ to ‘check if you need to pay towards your health care in the UK’…” Lou Downe (2015) Good services are verbs, bad services are nouns Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 9
Check if you need to pay towards your health care in the UK Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 10
verb Check if you need to pay towards your health care in the UK Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 11
verb Check if you need to pay towards your health care in the UK noun Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 12
verb Check if you need to pay towards your health care in the UK noun Immigration Health Surcharge Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 13
verb Check if you need to pay towards your health care in the UK noun Immigration Health Surcharge jargon Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 14
Public services are nouns and verbs
▪ Set up an account ▪ Sign in to your account ▪ Get access to your eVisa ▪ Check your state pension forecast ▪ Check your National Insurance record ▪ Find a job ▪ Upload your document ▪ Apply for a Blue Badge Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 16
Lou Downe’s definition of a service “A service is something that helps someone to do something.” Lou Downe (2020) Good Services Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 17
“A service is something that helps someone to do something.” verb Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 18
“A service is something that helps someone to do something.” verb Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba noun 19
noun “A service is something that helps someone to do something.” verb Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba noun 20
noun “A service is something Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 21
What is the user need here? Applying for probate ▪ No-one wants to apply for probate. ▪ They just want probate. Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 22
Verbs in Object Oriented UX “…are the affordances of your objects… “On Instagram, a post calls a user to like it, comment on it, bookmark it, and share it.” Sophia Prater (2022) Introducing ORCA: The Third Diamond in your UX Process Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 23
Verbs imply more Fergus Bisset (2025a) Verbs, nouns and the hierarchy of action in service design
“Book an appointment” Book Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 25
“Book an appointment” Book an Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba Appointment 26
“Book an appointment” Booking system User Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba books an Appointment 27
Verbs can imply a hierarchy of actions
“Apply for a Blue Badge” obtains applies for Mobility support Goal Blue Badge Task User Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba fills Form selects Submit button Subtask Operation 29
Verbs can imply multiple nouns and verbs Fergus Bisset (2025b) Case grammar and service semantics: Toward a richer vocabulary for action
“Buy” buys Buyer Item costs pays Money buys from receives sells Seller Warglien, Gärdenfors & Westera (2012) Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 31
“Book” User Provider books an provided by has a Appointment has time necessitates Goal Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba Slot 32
“Apply” makes Applicant has a necessitates Goal Application for Benefit has supports Evidence provides evaluates Authority Criteria Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 33
Service patterns
Kirsty Sinclair & Anusree Raju (2025) https://blogs.gov.scot/digital/2025/12/18/ reusable-service-patterns-in-scottish-public-sector-services/ Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 35
By Loic Djim loic - https://unsplash.com/photos/ft0-Xu4nTvAImage at the Wayback MachineGallery at the Wayback Machine, CC0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=61859582
Account Learn Apply Check Apply for an account Certificate Permission Payment Learn about Blue Badge Learn about planning permission Learn about state pensions Apply for a Blue Badge Apply for planning permission Check planning permission Check your account Pay Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba Pay for your Blue Badge Check your state pension Pay for planning permission 37
Public services are verbs and nouns
Bibliography ▪ Bisset, F. (2025a). Verbs, nouns and the hierarchy of action in service design. https://fergusbisset.com/week-notes/verbs-nouns-hierarchy-of-action ▪ Bisset, F. (2025b). Case grammar and service semantics: Toward a richer vocabulary for action. https://fergusbisset.com/research-updates/case-grammar-and-service-semantics ▪ Downe, L. (2015). Good services are verbs, bad services are nouns. https://designnotes.blog.gov.uk/2015/06/22/good-services-are-verbs-2/ ▪ Downe, L. (2020). Good Services. ▪ Norman, D. (1988). The Psychology of Everyday Things. ▪ Prater, S. (2022). Introducing ORCA: The third diamond in your UX process. https://ooux.com/resources/introducing-orca-the-third-diamond-in-your-ux-process ▪ Sinclair, K. & Raju, A. (2025). Reusable service patterns in Scottish public sector services. https://blogs.gov.scot/digital/2025/12/18/reusable-service-patterns-in-scottish-public-sector-services/ ▪ Stephen, D. (2025). Services are verbs combined with nouns. https://duncanstephen.net/services-are-verbs-combined-with-nouns/ ▪ Warglien, M., Gärdenfors, P. & Westera, M. (2012). Event structure, conceptual spaces and the semantics of verbs. Theoretical Linguistics, 38 (3-4), pp. 159-193. https://doi.org/10.1515/tl-2012-0010 Scottish Government | Riaghaltas na h-Alba 39
The meaning of public services
Information architecture normally focuses on the objects that need to be represented in a system. Some human-centred practitioners focus instead on the tasks users need to do.
These approaches are sometimes framed in opposition. But combining these techniques can make services and systems easier to use as well as more efficient to manage.
This session will explore what a public service is, how it is structured, and how we can go beyond verbs to create more meaning.
Biography
Duncan is a lead content designer, specialising in structured content and information architecture, at the Scottish Government.
He has a background as a user experience consultant, with deep exposure to user research, user experience strategy, and service design projects across a wide variety of sectors.
The following resources were mentioned during the presentation or are useful additional information.
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