UX Research | UI Design
Personal project. I visualized this client as one that wants to create a simple project management web app to complement their large-scale project management tool. The new tool will be free and easy to use.
User experience researcher, user interface designer.
Sketch, Adobe Comp CC, InVision, Milanote.
I love time management and task-tracking tools, both digital and analog. Every December, I carefully choose my planner for the following year, and my phone is bursting with all sorts of productivity and organizational tools: apps for note taking, calendars, list makers, scheduling tools... I just love the feeling I get when I check off a box after accomplishing a task. That is why I decided to design my own project management tool. I have my biases, obviously, so I wanted to conduct thorough research to define my users, create personas and develop a tool that favorably compares to exisiting ones.
First, I researched other business within the same market. I researched five tools, some I have previously used and some I was not familiar with.
I relied on heuristic methods and a spreadsheet to compile and compare my data.
I found that some project management tools are specifically marketed toward a particular segment (Thrive for freelancers, Jira for software developers, Basecamp for businesses), and others are more versatile and designed for general use (Trello and Asana). Different price points might limit choices, or availability and functionality of free features. These elements were common accross the board:
My next task was to define the needs of users of web-based project management tools and narrow down a target audience. I hypothesized that users will gravitate toward a web-based app that is free, easy to use, visually appealing and that can be tailored to fulfill general project management needs or specific ones.
When I looked for participants to interview at this stage, I looked for people who have used a project management tool in the past or are currently using one, who intend to use one in the future, or simply someone with familiarity with web-based apps. Ideally, a group of people with a mix of traits.
My initial research questions included:
I screened candidates using a simple Google Forms survey, and found six potential subjects who have used project management tools in the past. I interviewed them, dug deeper and figured out their needs, their preferences and thoughts about project management tools.
I asked them to rate their satisfaction level with the following features:
Aided by the information gathered through my initial survey and my interviews, I had an idea of my potential user personas. I relied on good old sticky notes to organize my information.
I used the organizational tool Milanote to craft my personas.
The first is Barbara, 29, a marketing director at a creative agency. She leads a team of five young people. She is tech-savvy and is always looking for new tools to incorporate into her workflow to be more efficient.
She has used Basecamp to manage projects in the past but realized that it has too many features she has no use for. She is practical and efficient, she knows when to delegate tasks and values energetic personalities.
Next is Zach, 32, a law firm associate and the youngest member of his three-person team. He has gradually become the go-to "tech" person among his colleagues.
He has used project tracking tools in the past, particularly for group school projects, but does not use one currently for his work.
He values efficiency and always has in mind the billing structure at his firm, where revenue is measured in billable hours. He is assertive and does not mind taking on a teaching role.
And we have Bill, 52, a former journalist who recently transitioned to a career in public relations. He is used to taking notes by hand but is willing to learn new technologies and tools.
He is aware that his job security depends on his ability to keep his skillset fresh, and he plans to leverage his tech knowledge for career advancement as he eyes retirement within the next ten years.
He is organized, loyal, a team player and a quick learner.
Again, I used Milanote to organize my moodboards. I organized them under mood words, colors, textures and shapes,layouts, typography and elements.
With the help of my moodboard and user personas, I began to sketch my ideas for the app experience.
My user flow for the initial prototype would include five screens:
To map out all of the screens a user will interact with, I used the iPad app Adobe Comp CC and used my sketches as a starting point to create low-fidelity wireframes.
From the main dashboard, the user will be able to hover over project cards to activate the overview section at the bottom of the screen. This overview section at the bottom will include details such as due dates, comments and attachments.
The right-side bar contains the list of team members. The idea at this stage is to allow the user to drag and drop team members into each project card at any point.
Individual project cards provide an overview of the project's title, descriptions, the number of tasks and whether they are overdue, small icons for team members, and the number of attachments. A new project card or button is available.
When the user creates a new project, a new project form will appear (not shown here) and the user will be asked to enter a project name, descriptions and to drag and drop team members. If team member profiles have to be created, the user can refer to the right sidebar to do so.
Once inside the project view, the user will have the ability to add tasks under three pre-made categories: to do, in progress and done. I will explore the possibility of giving the user the option to add more categories at this point.
Finally, the task view will contain an editable title, description and due date, a WYSIWYG text box, comment threads and the attachment area. The comments section will have its own scrolling function, with a preview of the comment and the ability to click to read the full comment, reply and create threads.
At this point, I jumped on Sketch to begin designing. After several iterations of the different screens and revisions of my user flow, I fleshed out a black-and-white mockup of my project management tool.
I decided to use the UMUX method (Usability Metric for User Experience) at this point, because the simplicity of this test would allow me to correct course if the reactions from my users as they interacted with my prototype were negative.
The UMUX method calls for two positive and two negative items, and I decided to use a five-point scale. The four items are:
If this were a large-scale project, I would have scored and reported my results with percentile ranks for each item and perhaps a quadrant display, and asked users to compare my tool with others in the market. Because this was a personal project and I did not have the resources to conduct large-scale surveys and tests, I limited my reporting to notes and impressions. I'm happy to report that my participants had a positive reaction to my prototypes. All said the tool met the requirements they expect of a free project management tool and the system seemed easy to use. None said that the experience was frustrating or that they spent too much time correcting course to find the desired path.
In addition to the UMUX test, I asked my users the Magic Wand question: If you had a magic wand and could change one thing about this project management app, what would it be?
The feedback I received to the Magic Wand question was:
I found this feedback very helpful and I am currently incorporating those changes. A new iteration of my prototype will be finalized soon.
This project is a work in progress.