What is the WeBER Policy Lab?

The WeBER Policy Lab is a collaborative, citizen-centred space for developing practical solutions to specific public administration challenges in the Western Balkans. It brings together public institutions, civil society, service users, and experts to jointly re-design policies and services, using an approach rooted in design thinking and user experience research.

By translating citizens’ real needs into prototypes—such as draft policy proposals, redesigned forms, process maps, or digital mock-ups—the Policy Lab helps administrations test and shape improvements that are concrete, feasible, and aligned with public administration reform (PAR) priorities. It is a bridge between dialogue and action, ensuring that citizens’ voices and evidence gathered through WeBER’s monitoring ecosystem directly inform reform processes.

How the Policy Lab Works

The WeBER Policy Lab follows the core stages of the design thinking methodology, adapted to the realities of public administration reform. This human-centred approach ensures that reforms are grounded in the lived experiences of citizens and service users, while remaining feasible for institutions to implement.

1. Empathise — Understanding citizens’ experiences

The process begins with gathering insights from those directly affected by a specific administrative problem. Through focus groups, interviews, surveys, and review of existing procedures, the Lab uncovers how citizens and frontline civil servants experience the service or policy in practice.

This phase identifies frustrations, unmet needs, and opportunities for improvement that are rarely visible in formal documents.

2. Define — Framing the problem together

Drawing on the insights from the empathising phase, WeBER partners and institutional actors jointly formulate a clear, evidence-based problem statement.

This step ensures that all stakeholders – ministries, agencies, CSOs, and users – share a common understanding of what needs to be solved and why. A well-framed problem helps avoid premature solutions and guides the later stages of co-creation.

3. Ideate — Co-creating possible solutions

The core of the process is the WeBER Policy Lab workshop, where institutions, CSOs, citizens, and experts come together to generate ideas. Using facilitated co-design techniques, participants reinterpret user insights, explore different angles, and develop practical concepts that could address the problem.

The goal is not to choose the “perfect” solution immediately, but to encourage creativity, challenge assumptions, and identify multiple promising approaches.

4. Prototype — Making ideas tangible

Promising ideas are then transformed into concrete, testable prototypes. Depending on the issue, these may include:

• revised forms or instructions for service users
• process maps or redesigned workflows
• draft policy proposals or legal provisions
• mock-ups of digital tools or platforms
• training modules or guidance materials for civil servants

Prototypes help make abstract ideas visible and actionable, allowing institutions and users to engage with them meaningfully.

5. Test — Refining solutions with institutions and users

Prototypes are reviewed and tested with institutional partners and, where relevant, with users. This step examines feasibility, legal and administrative constraints, resource requirements, and potential impact.
Feedback collected during testing guides further refinements and serves as the basis for advocating institutional adoption or integration into ongoing PAR processes.

6. Embedding results into reform processes

Finalised prototypes enter WeBER’s wider ecosystem:

• PAR working groups
• WeBER Platform discussions
• Citizens First Conferences
• policy briefs and advocacy efforts

Through these channels, Policy Lab outputs support evidence-based reform, strengthen dialogue between institutions and civil society, and promote changes that reflect citizens’ needs and expectations.

Serbia

In Serbia, CEP’s Policy Lab process began with an initial meeting with representatives of partner institutions, including the Ministry of Public Administration and Local Self-Government (MPALSG), the Public Policy Secretariat, the Ministry of Interior, and the Office for IT and e-Government. Following the presentation of the approach, participants jointly defined the main theme and objective: introducing a new service, a unified surname change service, based on the “life event” approach.

The research phase combined qualitative and desk research methods. It included a focus group with seven female users of the surname-change service, five in-depth interviews with service users, an e-questionnaire completed by representatives of the Ministry of Interior, and three interviews with experts from the MPALSG. In parallel, seven relevant laws and procedures were analysed.

Based on these insights, the main Policy Lab workshop event was held with representatives of the institutions involved. Two prototype service forms were developed and subsequently refined through additional iterations, resulting in concrete, user-centred solutions for improving the service.

Kosovo

In Kosovo, GLPS implemented a Policy Lab process focused on the digitalisation of educational credentials. The process began with a focus group bringing together institutional representatives, experts, and students to identify key challenges related to physical and notarised diplomas. Participants highlighted practical obstacles, administrative burdens, and user needs, forming the basis for problem definition.

Building on these insights, the Policy Lab workshop focused on moving toward practical solutions. Participants from government institutions, recognition authorities, policy organisations, and development partners explored pathways for digitalisation, discussed legal and technical constraints, and assessed institutional readiness. A questionnaire helped systematically capture feedback.

The process mapped key strengths, bottlenecks, such as fragmented data systems and legal limitations, and opportunities for improvement. It concluded with recommendations on system integration, data accuracy and privacy, regulatory clarity, and standardisation, laying the groundwork for a unified and secure digital credential platform and further solution prototyping.

North Macedonia

In North Macedonia, EPI organised a Policy Lab process aimed at improving service delivery to vulnerable groups of citizens, including persons with disabilities. The process began with consultations with key institutions to identify priority areas and challenges in public administration.

A focus group was conducted to gather insights into existing gaps, particularly in how civil servants interact with and provide services to vulnerable citizens. Based on these findings, a pilot training programme Service Delivery to Vulnerable Groups of Citizens with and without Disabilities was developed and delivered.

Participants explored differences between public and private services, mapped existing services, and assessed them against principles of inclusiveness. Through group work, they proposed improvements and defined measures for more accessible and citizen-oriented services. The pilot concluded with actionable steps, including enhanced communication, accessibility, and targeted staff training.

The tested curriculum now serves as a prototype for a Generic Training Programme under the Ministry of Public Administration, to be scaled up and systematically implemented for civil servants.

Montenegro

In Montenegro, Institute Alternative launched a Policy Lab process focused on improving how employment in public institutions is regulated. The process began with consultations with the Ministry of Public Administration to identify gaps in the fragmented framework and define challenges in establishing fair, transparent, and consistent recruitment procedures.

In parallel, Institute Alternative participated in the working group drafting the new Law on Public Institutions, providing a direct channel for shaping legal solutions. This engagement served as a functional substitute for focus groups, ensuring continuous input into the reform process.

The main Policy Lab event, held in June 2025, brought together representatives of ministries and trade unions to discuss how the new law should regulate employment. Participants emphasised transparent recruitment, clear standards, professional selection commissions, and standardised job descriptions.

The final prototype consists of draft legal provisions for the new Law on Public Institutions. These were tested through structured discussion, including debates on centralised versus decentralised HR management. The agreed solution was to centralise HR services by sector and/or territory.

Albania

In Albania, IDM initiated the Policy Lab process with a meeting with the Ministry of State for Public Administration and Anti-Corruption, presenting the design-thinking methodology. Ministry representatives endorsed the approach and participated in a brainstorming session to identify suitable areas for application.

Building on earlier cooperation under a SIDA-funded integrity project, IDM and the Department of Public Administration agreed to develop a roadmap for ethics advisors, conceived as a practical “bible” for their work. Multiple meetings with the Department and ethics advisors were held to gather input and refine content.

The Policy Lab workshop enabled participants to review and improve each section of the roadmap. Through this iterative process, a final draft was produced and approved by the Ministry. The document was officially launched during Integrity Week in December, reaching ethics advisors across institutions.