APT have made previous attempts to re-platform their systems but couldn't get the help they needed. A pilot using a low-code platform proved that re-platforming was possible. I joined the project during the first sprint and helped design 3 modules of their administrative platform.
Business goals
Rebuild APT's core business application from an unsupported legacy technology to a web application, while maintaining user familiarity and speed of processing.
My Role
- UX/UI Design Consultant
- Accessibility advisor
Project Challenges
- Unclear design expectations
- Complex, undocumented business rules
- Validate perceived design gaps
- Off-shore development model
- Changing Agile processes
Methodology
- Agile, 3 week sprints
- Stakeholder Interviews, Task Analysis, User Interviews, User Reviews, Accessibility Analysis
Understand user needs
To understand the purpose of each screen of the legacy application and to get to know the users I performed the following:
- Interviewed users and watched them perform their daily tasks
- Talked through any pain points I identified
- Along with the BA, I helped uncover the business rules for each task and field
- I mapped all existing fields and labels
After hearing the BAs telling me this is to be a direct translation from legacy to new, no design changes, I knew I had to clarify expectations around UX and design with the Product Owner. As work progressed and ongoing discussions were had, the Product Owner became a key advocate for design enhancements but tempered thinking around extensive visual design enhancements. The key objective was to re-platform and to address longstanding design gaps.
With clear knowledge of the users goals and the purpose of each module, I performed design exercises using a paste-up board with users and SMEs individually. They were able to "wireframe" their own field order and groupings on-the-fly until a consensus was reached:
- Which fields are required
- Which fields can be deleted
- What are the correct labels
- What are the most helpful default values
- Create groups of fields
- What’s the group label
- Sort group order
Collaborative Design
From the paste-up board, I could translate the field mappings into low-fi prototypes for testing with users. SMEs would also review the screens and workflow.
Adjustments were made where necessary and I'd proceed with a high-fi html prototype. Now users were able to review the changes:
- new defaults for certain fields
- auto-population of fields on change
- toggling of hidden fields
- fields in modals
- conditional rules for required fields
- and experience solutions to the longstanding design gaps
It was also and opportunity to test for usability and accessibility issues. It was essential that all work could be performed via a keyboard.
After another review with SMEs, approval would be given and the prototype would be handed to the development team.
To overcome communications issues with the off-shore dev team and ensure clarity around expectations, I'd walkthrough each section of each module to help them estimate development time and see that they understood each interaction as it was intended.
Outcome
First module launched into production Dec 2018
I handed over my knowledge and process to the newly hired in-house designer and provided recommendations for some application wide enhancements.