Reflection: Visualization

Challenge

Blue collar employees within our large organization have joined in partnership with the company in a  concerted effort to address workplace health concerns for those same employees.  This collaboration  has been proven successful over the years and in time has grown to give rise to additional opportunities  that enhance employee job skills, opportunities for education and further career development.

The primary method to deliver communications, training and learning opportunities has been through a  web site which, after many years, had grown increasingly stagnant.  Employees were having difficulties  finding the information they needed quickly and efficiently and training resources / delivery models  were inconsistent.  The site had become outdated and off the mark in our corporate brand visually and  operationally.  In a word, it was in need of an overhaul.

Selection

As a front-end web designer, Visualization has proved to be a valuable tool for me.  I’ve utilized it at  various levels of the design process, from using it as a bridge to help resolve divergent viewpoints, to  rough mockups that help validate a position supporting a particular design direction.  Like Angela Meyer  mentions in her video, we have found that the Visualization tool has a role to play in each phase of the  design process.

Application

As a part of the discovery process and to better aid us in getting to the root of the need, we sent out a  simple questionnaire to many of the employees who used the site regularly.  We invited them, in their  own words, to help shed light on a few simple questions. (Two of the four questions and their answers  are shown below):

(1) What do you believe are the top three reasons people visit the web site?

a. Show reimbursement  b. Education/career explore  c. Contacts, location, organization

(2) What would cause people come to the site and visit it more often?

a. Education  b. Career advising  c. Career advancement

Because of this particular approach, there was a risk that our response rate would be very low. In fact, it  turned out that our response rate was much greater than what we’d anticipated, both in number of  responses and in the quality of advice we received.  It reflected a personal ownership to these Company  initiatives; something they believed in and took seriously – they wanted this effort to succeed.  From this  exercise, we were able to gain a better understanding of their mindset and what was important to them.

Being empathetic to their needs set the tone for us to embark on our journey together towards an  optimal solution.

We began prototyping using simple primitive wireframes that promoted a higher visibility for  reimbursements.  The ability for reimbursement was frequently identified as a key element as it was  presently buried in the current site.  Employees would be reimbursed for safety shoes and there was a  process which needed to be followed.  On our home page wireframe, we promoted the reimbursement  element front and center in addition to being accessible from a dropdown menu.

We learned that consistency in the way education/ training was accessed was among the most  important reason people visited the site.  Through our site audit, we discovered a significant  inconsistency in the way training/learning was presented in both the health portion and the career  development portion of the web site.  After reviewing the training modules and identifying consistent  patterns we noticed in all of them, we were able to craft a common template in our concept primitives  that included all the key elements and framing of information.  We proposed a common approach to all  relevant training.

Insight

The site audit, ensured the end user was a part of the reformulation process in the early stages of  redesign and allowed empathy towards their needs, desires and concerns.  It gave us a strong position in  orienting them towards the most effective, beneficial, and usable web presence for their engagement  and learning needs.  We reviewed our concepts and wireframe with the business partner and were in  agreement to begin development of the visual composites.

This work is presently in progress, so we will continue to employ the Visualization tool in every aspect of  the design process as appropriate.  Applying the Visualization tool has led us to the position of a strong  wireframe concept, one that we will build upon and develop.

Approach

We have been successful so far applying the Visualization tool to construct a viable and solid wireframe  of the redesigned web presence, but in retrospect, had we initially met with a handful of employees as a  sampling, and used the questionnaire as a companion for the body of users who engage the site, we  might have gained an even greater understanding into the nuances of the user’s needs.

