Antony Poveda
@tonytoners.bsky.social
Some sort of designer/Head of Morale, mainly content. Working for users of government. Stealing all your best ideas since 2014 (reading stuff, not much posting). antonypoveda.design Sheffield.
An interesting bit of history at GOV.UK - to begin with content design was mostly about long form guidance. When we started designing services we found that there are some differences in how you approach content design for interfaces: www.gov.uk/service-manu...
Writing for user interfaces
Doing content design for user interfaces, including style, tone and how to write questions.
gov.uk
I am begging, err, maybe everyone? Please stop telling me what things are 'not'. Save your poor readers' time, and my sanity, and just skip to what it actually is. Please please please. Thank you 🙏. #UselessScreamsIntoTheVoid
Half-month weeknote for July - in which I achieve some goals ahead of a holiday, stick on the OOO, and expect everything in the organisation to be just where I left it in 2 weeks' time: antonypoveda.design/weeknotes/18... #weeknotes
Half - 6 to 17 July
Focused goals and a helpful diagram.
antonypoveda.design
Content-first prototyping, low-fidelity prototypes, and why I like to keep things sketchy for as long as possible. www.linkedin.com/pulse/keep-y...
Keep your designs low fidelity until the thinking is done
There’s a constant battle in content design to hold off higher-fidelity prototyping until we’ve finished thinking and collaborating. Content designers often push for a ‘content first’ approach.
linkedin.com
In a break from my usual Funding service posts, I’ve written about my other portfolio. And one of my favourite things, Portals! The portal trap cathydutton.co.uk/posts/the-po...
The portal trap
No one likes portals, one-stop shops, single front doors or gateways, so why are they the go-to solution for so many large organisations?
cathydutton.co.uk
Ace writeup of the redesign for this critical guidance for gov content: insidegovuk.blog.gov.uk/2026/06/08/l...
Launching GOV.UK's new content and publishing guidance
We’ve overhauled the GOV.UK content and publishing guidance. Find out what’s changed, why this is a major improvement for government publishers, and what we learned from testing.
insidegovuk.blog.gov.uk
2 day week, the green shoots of a note - what kind of garden should we grow? antonypoveda.design/weeknotes/06... #weeknotes #GovDesign
Garden - 4 to 5 June
Overgrown metaphors and ideas gaining traction.
antonypoveda.design
This is on Tuesday, if you're in any part of the public sector and up for meeting some real interesting people in Sheffield 👇👇
Antony Poveda@tonytoners.bsky.social · 3mo agoThe next 'X-Gov Sheffield' breakfast meetup for public sector folk is on 2 June! Sadly I’m away for this one, but don’t let that stop you signing up if you’re in the area 👇
A weeknote, in which I document documenting designing design skills. antonypoveda.design/weeknotes/23... #weeknotes #GovDesign
Document - 18 to 22 May
antonypoveda.design
🚨 Come to GDS and (content) design the Service Manual and Service Standard! Permanent SEO level Content Designer, helping provide the standards, principles and guidance for creating and running digital services. Deadline end of 1st June Bristol, London, Manchester £45,131 - £51,406 bit.ly/4v81vhM
Quick Check Needed
civilservicejobs.service.gov.uk
The next 'X-Gov Sheffield' breakfast meetup for public sector folk is on 2 June! Sadly I’m away for this one, but don’t let that stop you signing up if you’re in the area 👇
Microsoft Forms
forms.office.com
This has cheered me up on a day when other things have not. Just downloaded the report for some late afternoon reading. I hope the rest of it doesn't give me nightmares: royalsociety.org/news-resourc...
Science for society | Royal Society
The Royal Society has published the Science for society report exploring the multiple connections between science and the public, and proposes recommendations for how these connections might be streng...
royalsociety.org
Jack Stilgoe@jackstilgoe.bsky.social · 3mo agoThe % of scientists who think public engagement makes science better has gone up from 21% in 2006 to 64% now. That's huge.
Weeknote for 10 to 15 May. Warning, octopuses: antonypoveda.design/weeknotes/16... #Weeknotes #GovDesign
a new post, the first in a two-parter, on the epistemology of design mikegallagher.org/posts/the-lo...
Mike Gallagher: The logic of conjecture
On the epistemplogy of design and the importance of making things to think through problems
mikegallagher.org
It's May and I'm still trialling writing weekly notes to reflect and let others see what I do as a public servant. This week: short one on 3ish days of planning/jira, a surprise review, some content design, and hanging out: antonypoveda.design/weeknotes/10... #GovDesign #weeknotes
Stuffed - 5 to 8 May
antonypoveda.design
A 'weeknote' for all of April when I did very little #govdesign but did read actual books. #weeknotes Leave - April 2026: antonypoveda.design/weeknotes/04...
New blog post: NHS Goes To War Against Open Source https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2026/05/nhs-goes-to-war-against-open-source/ The NHS is preparing to close nearly all of its Open Source repositories. Throughout my time working for the UK Government - in GDS, NHSX, i.AI, and others - I championed …
NHS Goes To War Against Open Source
The NHS is preparing to close nearly all of its Open Source repositories. Throughout my time working for the UK Government - in GDS, NHSX, i.AI, and others - I championed Open Source. I spoke to dozens of departments about it, wrote guidance still in use today, and briefed Ministers on why it was so important. That's why I'm beyond disappointed at recent moves from NHS England to backtrack on…
shkspr.mobi
Do you need a separate design system for your staff vs public facing services? It’s a common question, but at the NHS we think the answer is No. I’ve published a blog post to explain why: digital.nhs.uk/blog/design-...
One design system is better than 2 - NHS England Digital
Frankie and Ananda explain why the NHS design system is not just for public-facing services, with an overview of recent changes to meet the needs of staff-facing services. There’s also mo...
digital.nhs.uk
Wow massive flashback to my time in kitchens and working this out. The machine. Can. Never. Stop. Great (huge) thread on how workplaces really work.
By Cory Doctorow (GPG 0xBF3D9110957E5F4C)@doctorow.pluralistic.net · 4mo ago> This machine takes 2 minutes to run a cycle. We are on the clock for 8h. That means we have a maximum of 240 times we can run this machine. If you want to wash all those dishes, clean your station, mop and clock off by midnight? This machine has to be on and running every second of the shift. 38/
Very late weeknote for the end of last month, for reasons. Back in May! #govdesign #weeknotes antonypoveda.design/weeknotes/05...
New - 23 to 27 March
antonypoveda.design
A good piece about content-first design from the Defra design blog: "With prototyping tools at your disposal, it may feel like a waste of time focusing on content as a first step. But using only words helped our team to understand the purpose of each interaction."
Doing content-first design at Defra – part one
In the first of a two-part post, content designer Laura Parker and senior interaction designer Daniel da Silveira explain how and why they took a content-first approach to creating a form building too...
defradigital.blog.gov.uk
Work is a social relationship. We create things together. This is especially true of UX design. AI's value proposition is freedom from relationships. So when designers champion AI tools, we are not making ourselves layoff-proof. We are reinforcing a system that frames us as unnecessary friction.
UX works through social relationships. AI tools are erasing them.
Stakeholders want to vibe code and have designers clean up after them afterwards. But rather than helping with velocity, there is just more noise and more work for everyone.
productpicnic.beehiiv.com
This week - Human writing, meetups and mugs: #weeknotes #govdesign antonypoveda.design/weeknotes/21...
As a public servant, I'm trialling writing weekly notes to let people see what I do. #weeknotes #govdesign This week: Vertigo antonypoveda.design/weeknotes/14...
Vertigo - 9 to 13 March
antonypoveda.design
As a public servant, I'm trying out writing weekly notes to let people see what I do. #weeknotes #govdesign This week: antonypoveda.design/weeknotes/28...
Requirement - 23 to 27 February
antonypoveda.design
