How human-centred design gives migrant workers a sense of dignity and a better quality of life

At the end of 2021, the Dormitories Association Singapore Ltd. (DASL) commissioned Agency, an award-winning human-centred design firm, to reimagine dormitories for migrant workers here as part of Project Commune. Founded at the end of 2016, Agency uses radical and empathetic methodology to solve real-world problems with design.

A culmination of previous years of groundwork made even more urgent after the Covid-19 outbreak and lockdown, the project won Fast Company’s 2023 Innovation by Design Award in the Asian-Pacific Region category and a Singapore Good Design (SG Mark) Gold Award in August 2023.

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The recipients: the almost 320,000 migrant workers hailing from South Asia, mostly from the construction and shipyard sectors, who were housed in close quarters and bore the brunt of Singapore’s pandemic lockdown in 2020. 

Only allowed in their dormitories and workplaces, they were kept away from the general public in the government’s attempt to curb the spread of the virus. Till late 2021, they were still put under strict restrictions, allowed in public areas for only a few hours at a time, garnering the attention of the public and local NGOs worried for their welfare.

All restrictions were finally lifted in mid-2022, about 26 months after the initial lockdown. 

Putting people first

Fresh off the furore, the case study sought to improve the living conditions in dormitories. Agency carried out an estimated one-month research project before setting up a showroom that was tested out by eight dormitory residents over the course of 10 days. The question posed was: How can the dormitories be improved on a more “emotional human level”? How do you make it feel like home? 

From first speaking to the stakeholders — operators, managers, and residents — to immersive observation by spending time with the workers as they moved from place to place, the team at Agency went the extra mile to adhere to their human-centred design ethos. 

Peter Overy, co-founder and managing director, shared that getting consent from the workers was crucial to allowing them to wander through the private areas in the dormitories and ensuring that they were present at the right times in the day to observe how the spaces were being used. 

“Some of the team went out and did overnight stays (to observe them) early in the morning. The other thing that’s a challenge is making sure that we’re representative of the people that we’re meeting. I’m a bald, white angmoh, so it’s not me that can go. We don’t want to intimidate… or seem like some sort of authority,” he added. 

In total, the team spoke to 39 individuals from the dormitory ecosystem and identified six types of residents and two types of dormitory managers they wanted to encourage. For residents, they included the Long-Distance Parent, the social butterfly Unofficial MP, and the Mentor, a seasoned worker used to the system. 

Creating the prototype

Project Commune revolved around three insights gleaned from the research: residents are not only workers but also fathers, husbands, and sons; a strong community and positive dormitory culture can be created by sharing small moments and can be supported from the ground up; and dormitories should be designed for long-term use instead of short-term use.

To find solutions, Agency’s team looked at the other existing types of infrastructure that were already emulating the best way to recreate a home away from home — hotels. They visited a grassroots organisation to get ideas on how to engage the community. “The answer to this problem is not solely in the dormitories; it’s found also in other areas of society,” he explained. 

A clear delineation of spaces for different uses was essential for privacy and cleanliness. This was achieved by partitions separating a communal area from the bunk beds, ample storage options from hooks to lockers, and a private study area or call booth.

The rooms also included different clocks set to the time zones of the residents’ home countries and a dormitory stamp tour to orient newcomers to the compound. He added, “We were activating space, community and engagement in people.”

In September 2023, after consolidating research done by Agency and other companies, the Ministry of Manpower (MoM) announced new standards for dormitories, such as an ensuite and a more modular build for each dormitory, to prevent another virus outbreak from happening. This included mandatory outdoor recreational areas.  

Optimistic next steps

Now, almost three years after Project Commune began, while Agency’s prototype room hasn’t exactly been adopted wholesale by dormitory operators, the project has “sparked off a series of other behavioural community engagements”. 

Celebrating occasions such as birthdays or Father's Day is an inexpensive yet highly effective way to build a sense of community for groups of men who were otherwise strangers. Some dormitory operators, such as Tee Up, were already organising such activities, but Overy shares that they’ve brought the celebrations into the dormitories, creating more organic, intimate opportunities for bonding. 

By using design thinking, they could add onto existing “hardware” or “software” to create incremental changes to the present situation. He quipped, “The work we do is using design as a tool for establishing a very different way of engaging and nurturing people through different stages of their everyday lives to improve (it) in some form or another.”

He understands that bringing about improvement requires an investment of time, money, and energy on the part of all stakeholders. For now, he’s effusive about Singapore’s government's openness to feedback, which was also partly the reason why the Agency is based in the country. He added, “Here, there’s a willingness, there’s an intention… You get to work on important, challenging problems that need solving.”