The Estonian Government

Equip teams with tools to design behaviour-centred policies.

WORK

1/10/20254 min read

Equip teams with tools to design behaviour-centred policies

The Estonian Government's Innovation Centre

  • Behavioural Change Awareness Sessions

  • Hands-On Behavioural Design Sprints

  • Provision and Licensing of Behavioural Design Tools

Public services shape lives, but only if they meet real human behaviours. Estonia’s Innovation Centre at the heart of The Estonian Government set out to bring behavioural science into government. The goal? Make policies more human-centred and lead to lasting behaviour change.

They didn’t need more theory. They needed tools and processes to make behavioural insights practical. That’s where we came in.

Overview

Policy teams deal with tough problems. But traditional approaches often miss the human element. Here’s what we found:

  • Lack of awareness:
    Policymakers and designers within the government teams didn’t know how behavioural science could improve results.

  • No practical tools:
    Teams had no clear way to apply behavioural insights to daily work.

  • Sustainability risks:
    Without long-term support, behavioural science risked being a one-off idea, not a permanent change.

To create lasting impact, we had to solve these issues first.

The problem

We focus on making behavioural science usable. For Estonia’s Innovation Lab, this meant hands-on training, clear tools, and live applications.

They brought together multiple departments: from health, to home, workplace and police.

Here’s what we did:

1. Build Awareness at the top

We started with ministers and department heads. Using real-world examples, we showed how behavioural science creates better outcomes. This built trust and buy-in from leadership.

2. Introduce The Drive Grid

We taught teams our framework, The Drive Grid, which maps the nine factors that influence behaviour. It gave them a simple, actionable way to understand and tackle policy challenges.

3. Provide practical tools

We equipped teams with tools like Understand Others Kit and Change Behaviour Kit. These tools helped them diagnose problems and design better interventions right away.

4. Run behaviour sprints

Teams used their new skills on real issues like vaccine hesitancy, workplace diversity, and police-community trust. These quick sprints turned insights into real-world results.

5. Build for the future

We created behavioural roadmaps and licensed our tools, including the Change Behaviour Kit, for long-term use. Teams could now continue applying behavioural insights without needing outside support.

Our approach

Department of Health

How do we encourage vaccination?

Like many governments, the Department of Health within the Estonian Government saw vaccine hesitancy as a major public health challenge. They believed a new marketing campaign could convince more people of the benefits of vaccination. Their initial goal for the behaviour sprint was clear: design a communications strategy that would promote vaccines effectively.

What we found

A changing doctor-patient dynamic

Through behavioural reframing, driver research, and behaviour change design, we uncovered a critical insight:

Generational expectations were misaligned

  • Older generations trusted doctors as authoritative figures. They expected to be told what to do and followed recommendations without question.

  • Younger generations wanted collaboration. They expected doctors to engage in dialogue, explain options, and address their concerns openly.

This shift in expectations was causing friction. Doctors, trained to assume authority, weren’t meeting younger patients’ need for discussion. As a result, trust was eroding, patients looked to online communities for information and vaccine hesitancy grew.

How the focus shifted

The sprint reframed the challenge. Instead of designing a marketing campaign, we focused on the doctor-patient relationship—the foundation of trust in healthcare.

  • Mapping key touchpoints:
    We identified critical moments where doctors interacted with patients, from initial appointments to follow-ups. These touchpoints were opportunities to build trust, or lose it.

  • Redefining communication styles:
    We helped teams design communication patterns tailored to different generations. Older patients still valued clear, authoritative guidance, while younger patients needed open, two-way conversations.

  • Relationship-building strategies:
    Tools and interventions focused on fostering trust at these key touchpoints, making vaccine conversations more effective.


The Outcome

What began as a marketing campaign became a strategy to redefine doctor-patient communication. The focus on trust-building led to a deeper understanding of the hesitancy problem and more effective interventions.

Behaviour Sprint spotlight
"Alterkind’s training helped me see behaviour problems differently. The tools worked for everyone—even colleagues with no design experience. It’s been a game-changer for our team."

Daniel Kotsjuba, Designer of Public Services, Innovation Lab, Estonia

Results

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