“Don’t find customers for your products, find products for your customers.”
~Seth Godin
The Problem to Solve
The Appraisal team had been working to build efficiencies with the practices they follow including through technologies they use. One of the key processes they have is conducting onsite Appraisals for customers. This often means riding in a truck around a farming operation verifying assets as part of the valuation. They were capturing this information either from. a printed report (for existing customers), or a rough draft that was handwritten. They would write any additions or changes on the report or on a notepad, and enter the details into their appraisal software once they were back in the office. The Business wanted to streamline capturing Appraisal inventories.
Challenges
The new system would need to be responsive with minimal touch points as to not slow the Appraiser down. The Appraisers are often in a vehicle or outside when conducting an appraisal, so the new technology would need to be easily viewable with bright sunlight with touchpoints that were forgivable when using on an uneven terrain. Remote connectivity can be an issue in some rural areas, so it needed to operate seamlessly when offline.
Approach
My role was to create a UX Plan that address the needs of new Appraisal Inventory technology. I was involved with the product team from kickoff through the testing of the new application. I started by interviewing the Product Manager to understand their Business Strategy and Goals. The UX Plan included observing Appraisers in the field, a Design Thinking Workshop, Wireframes, Prototyping and Usability Testing, and Visual Designs.
Observations
To really understands the users we were designing for and the environment they are working in, we conducted observation studies of actual Appraisals in the field. This was the best way to see how they were accomplishing their tasks. The observation continued at the office where the Appraiser would transform their notes into an Appraisal system. The field observations were conducted by 2 UX Designers (I was unavailable at the time) with thorough images, debrief, and a summary report. We also requested additional Appraiser notes to understand what information was captured in the variety of operations they would visit.
Workshop
I facilitated 2 day “Design Thinking” workshop with another UX Designer, Appraisers, Stakeholders, the Product Manager, and a few from the Development Team. The workshop started with research findings from the observation and had a Q & A with Appraisers in the workshop for more details.
Sketching
It was important to get our user’s ideas and visualization of an application they could use to replace their notepads and reports. On day one of the workshop, we completed a sketching session with all participants in the workshop. Everyone sketches, shares their sketch and ideas with the group and sketches again.
Wireframes
Utilizing the sketches, product goals, and research I created wireframes of the FieldTrip app in UX Pin. The first set of wireframes were completed after the day 1 of the workshop, and presented for feedback on day 2 of the workshop. This was a great way to solicit immediate feedback from the users while they were still on location.
Wireframes throughout the engagement were completed by myself and another UX Designer.
Usability Testing
Moderated usability testing was completed at a regular cadence with users on both the wireframes and then once development of the application was underway we used the testing development environment. This gave us great insights to what was working well and what needed to be improved along the way. The tests were often conducted outdoors (sunlight), or on-site during an appraisal. We wanted to prove the speed and accuracy of inventory captured through the app on an iPad. Each usability testing session included a debrief with the team, a usability summary report, and prioritization of items to address.
Visual Designs
Visual Design were created in Sketch and were based on the wireframes and continuous feedback from the product manager, users and the technical team. Getting feedback from the technical team was vital to make sure the user experience we were creating was within the technical scope of the project and team. Visual Designs were created by myself and another UXDesigner.
Usability Testing Format
Usability testing scripts, tasks, and observer forms were used throughout the testing sessions. Each observer took notes and indicated if the task was completed successfully, with assistance, or not at all.