One Page Summary

How might we help Foundation Zajednički with a model that provides the elderly with high quality and personal support for the daily activities and for social companionship?

This was clearly a “wicked problem” to tackle so we needed to understand the different dimensions of the problem in order to design a valid solution.

We started our exploratory journey by conducting secondary research. We gathered the most relevant available data on the subject. Specially insightful was the Later life in 2015 report, a 2015 research study commissioned to Ipsos Mori by the Centre for Ageing Better.

The study was designed to better understand the barriers and enablers to a good later life. What we learned from this study is that above all critical factors, social connections were key. Population segments with strong social connections had a higher perceived well-being than their peers with weaker social connections even with poorer health.

We conducted interviews with actors involved: senior citizens, charities helping the elderly, volunteers. We talked with Foundation Zajednički. We used Jobs-to-be-done theory to look at the different competing solutions.

We searched for evidence based working solutions on the space. We tried to understand the constraints involved:

• How might we going to reach a hard-to-reach population?
• How might we overcome the challenge of IT illiteracy among this population segment?
• How might we make the model sustainable and less dependant to donations and volunteers work?
• How success might look like if the solution was successful?

We concluded that the expected outcomes of our solution should be:

• Elderly people engage with people in meaningful ways with total trust
• Elderly people age in place and the deterioration of wellbeing is prevented or delayed

Surrey Heath Age concern (SHAC) is a charity working in the borough of Surrey Heath, UK. Their mission is “making life better for older people in “Surrey Heath”. They offer several services to fulfil their mission. Among them, “Tea and memories” and “Tea and chatter”.

Two regular events with the aim to connect elderly people together in a relaxed atmosphere. One event takes place on the Rainbow Cafe, belonging to the charity and the other one is hosted in one of the elderly's own home who in turns might host the event.

The event is possible with the help of a group of drivers who volunteer to pick up, stay with the older person and drop them back home afterwards. Aside the popularity of those events, always fully booked with a waiting list of participants, the events are making a huge impact on the lives of older people attending.

“All in all a great time was had by all, myself and my parents had a fantastic time, but for me the highlight was seeing the older generation really enjoying themselves!”

What if we could replicate this model overcoming the existing challenges the charity is facing in running the service? The challenges are mainly two: the services rely on a very human intensive work ran by the charity team and they lack funds to reach more people (volunteers and elderly people) to make a wider impact.

Our solution is a safe community, supported by a digital platform and a group of volunteers to enable elderly people to meet and do things together.

They can meet to chat, be with other people their age, share common interests and take classes together. The community is also open to professionals (language teachers, yoga instructors, artists, etc) who can create events and offer them to hard-to-reach elderly people. Independent professionals will pay to host events in the platform and the money will finance transportation costs and the maintenance of the digital platform.

Our solution compared to others is unique because it is …

UNIVERSAL Our universal social network design works for senior citizens who do not have access to technology or little or no knowledge of it and senior citizens with physical impairment and limited mobility.

INCLUSIVE Our solution is inclusive to senior citizens, they are a key element of the solution. They can be event guests or hosts (to play cards, to discuss politics or share their passion for books for example)

SUSTAINABLE Our solution includes a revenue model. The platform will charge a fee to independent professionals to host events. Event organisers can decide whether to charge a fee to event participants.

We will recruit and select volunteers really carefully, doing full background checks. We will ask for referrals and they will need to pass an interview. We will assess their soft skills such as empathy and compassion. Before they can start, they will be trained.

We will assess senior citizens. We need to understand their needs (physical and mental) but also what they want, what they like and dislike.

The model will scale. We will start with a pilot in one venue and we will replicate the model to additional venues supported by a common digital platform and automated processes.