In June 2024, our team surveyed staff of Community-Based Organizations (CBOs) who use One Degree; as part of our commitment to building equity-centered technology. We aimed to understand their experience with One Degree and how we can help them better serve their clients/patients. In particular, we were curious about how organizations have been managing and tracking their referrals to people in need.

In total, we received 43 responses from direct service staff across our various regions. These participants represent a range of organizations including county libraries, school districts, community health departments, senior centers, treatment centers, and youth development centers. Examples of roles held by the participants included social worker, resource specialist, registered nurse, substance use counselor, community health worker, etc. While 43 survey participants can’t reflect the entirety of our member base, their varied experiences and use cases give us key insights. 

Major Takeaways

Most participants expressed satisfaction with the ease of use and vast resources offered by One Degree. 78% of respondents indicated they would recommend One Degree to a colleague. 

However, building trust is an ongoing process. Survey participants emphasized feeling confident when referring clients to accurate, up-to-date, and available resources. In addition, some mentioned that systems that foster real human connections can best achieve this level of trust. Suggestions on this survey to foster human connections include:

• Direct access to speak to real people at other organizations
• Additional language support to include more communities in our regions
• Greater awareness of community events and workshops to meet others on One Degree

“More resources with an actual open resource. Instead of being told to call back or to contact them in a few months.” 

The survey also revealed the importance of digital tracking of referrals. Around 90% of respondents reported making referrals in their day-to-day work, with half indicating that digital tracking was valuable for follow-up purposes. Furthermore, integrations to systems such as electronic health records (EHRs) and 211 make referrals more effective and compatible with their work.

Taking Action

“I would need to know who and how resources are vetted. I only want to send the parents I support to organizations who are known to handle people with the utmost care.”

Our various feedback collection processes including this survey are actively shaping our roadmap. The feedback communicated a central theme of trust. Trust in service providers. Trust in resource information. Trust in entire ecosystems of care. As such, here are a few areas that we’re currently focusing on.

Networks of Trust: We’re exploring features to build trust through real connections and assurance of resource data accuracy. We have written previously about our extensive resource verification process in previous blogs. 

However, we want to delve deeper into methods for information accuracy and timeliness for details such as resource availability and quality. Furthermore, we would like our platform to connect different service providers better together and engage in a human-to-human connection.

Language Expansion: We’re testing how to support more languages on our platform to ensure inclusivity.

Enhanced Resource Transparency: We’re improving data accuracy and clarity around resource availability, including capacity and wait times.

Staying Connected

Thank you to everyone who completed our survey. We do this work to support you and our community. It is necessary to build with you to earn our place as a trusted partner. We will contact our CBO partners in the coming months to further guide our platform’s direction. Together, we can work toward better outcomes for those in need.

If you’re interested in collaborating with us or learning more about One Degree:

• Join our Community Feedback Group
• Visit our FAQs 
• Reach out to us at help@1degree.org