Conducted a mixed methods analysis for the calendar feature redesign
Lead UX Researcher | Generative Research for a Redesign
MY ROLE
Lead UX Researcher
KEY ACTIVITIES
User Interviews
Usability Testing
UI/UX Audit
Recommendations
COMPANY
Highland Ag Solutions
INDUSTRIES
SaaS Solution
Enterprise Solution
B2B
DATE
2023
Project Overview
The Challenge
As the Lead UX Researcher at Highland Ag Solutions, I tackled a key challenge: redesigning the calendar feature to better align with user needs. My task was to explore both tactical and strategic opportunities and provide recommendations for the entire group of stakeholders. Our calendar feature, designed for agricultural professionals, was facing issues with low user acquisition and retention.
Methods I Used
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UI/UX Audit w/Analytics
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8 Remote Moderated Interviews
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6 Remote Moderated Usability Tests
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Likert Scale Survey
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Affinity Mapping + Dot Voting Workshop
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"As Is" Customer Journey Map
My Deliverables
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Research Report
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UI/UX Audit Report
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Journey Map
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Recommendations
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Comprehensive Presentation
Project Impacts
The complete redesign of the Food Safety product is still in progress, making impact data not applicable at this time. However, here are some user testimonials highlighting the impact and importance of listening to users:
"The current calendar is not useful. Initially, we had many concerns when switching to Highland Hub. However, we are excited to see the upcoming improvements. We've discussed switching back before, but you're addressing our concerns."
- Food Safety Manager
"We're excited to see the upcoming improvements and increased usability at the corporate level. As a director, I currently can't view calendars for all sites when I log in. It would be fantastic to have this capability. The updates will allow me to view calendars for all sites and track their percentage of completion." - Director, Food Safety and Compliance
Outcome
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The product and design teams gained a clear understanding of how users interact with the calendar feature.
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Identified key areas for improvement and suggested user-centered recommendations to enhance functionality and user satisfaction in the new version.
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Updated the product roadmap with a prioritized list of accessibility issues for immediate remediation in production.
Research
The Challenge: A Potential Tool Held Back by Usability Issues
As the Lead UX Researcher at Highland Ag Solutions, I tackled a key challenge: redesigning the calendar feature to better align with user needs. My task was to explore both tactical and strategic opportunities and provide recommendations for the entire group of stakeholders. Our calendar feature, designed for agricultural professionals, was facing issues with low user acquisition and retention.
Major usability issues
Design doesn’t connect with audience
Difficult activation for first-time users
Low user retention rates
Users are hesitant to add calendar items
Research Methods: Tools to Understand the Issues in Production
To start, I opted to conduct a comprehensive UI/UX audit instead of a heuristic evaluation. This approach allowed for a more thorough evaluation of the product's user interface and experience, aiming to identify existing issues and inform the design process. I also investigated the frequency of interactions within the calendar to understand how users engaged with the current system.
Research Questions Guiding the Calendar Redesign
Here are some questions that this research aims to answer for both the calendar and Food Safety:
1
Understand Usability Barriers
What usability issues are hindering users from completing tasks efficiently, and how do these affect their primary goals?
2
Evaluate Functionality Satisfaction
Which functionalities are users satisfied or dissatisfied with, and what improvements can be made based on these insights?
3
Incorporate Generative Data
How can generative data be incorporated to enhance the feature redesign and align with the development schedule?
Analyzing User Behavior: From Data to Actionable Insights
After the user interviews and usability tests, I transcribed and coded the data, then created a thematic analysis. Using different colored sticky notes for each participant, I identified key themes, patterns and insights from the interviews. Following that, I facilitated an internal dot voting workshop with stakeholders.
Affinity mapping with dot voting. Image is blurred for user privacy.
3 Priority Fixes Identified by Stakeholders
Enhance Usability of Items
Improve the usability of items in the monthly, weekly, daily views.
Calendar Integration
Connect items in the calendar directly to the Daily Log feature.
Admin Controls
Enable admins to edit, move, and monitor all employee items.
I know creating the customer journey map after dot voting is unconventional, but every study is different! This time the stakeholder team and I decided it was better to create the journey map afterward. We felt we needed a more detailed focus on the areas identified as top priorities, making the journey mapping exercise more targeted and effective and to ensure these fixes are effectively implemented.
Customer journey map emphasizing the top priority areas identified during the dot voting workshop.
Lastly, I applied a severity ranking scale, integrating the audit results with insights from interviews and usability tests. I assigned severity ratings to each issue, ranging from 'critical' to 'no problem,' to clearly communicate the issues to stakeholders. We then filtered the sheet by 'User Feedback' and 'Severity Rating' to effectively compare and prioritize the findings.
Excel sheet ranked by 'Severity Rating'
Excel sheet ranked by 'User Feedback'
Key Insights: The Major Issues I Identified
Critical issues represent severe usability or accessibility problems that must be resolved before the product's release. Low-priority issues are minor usability concerns that are addressed if time allows. All critical issues by severity rating identified in the audit were accessibility-related. Additionally, user sentiment played a role in ranking issues for the stakeholder report. Over half of the users expressed significant frustration with key aspects of the calendar feature, and some considered abandoning Food Safety, justifying the critical ranking!
A few slides from the UI/UX Audit Report.
Most issues were high and medium issues. In this case, I identified significant issues related to the user interface and user flow.
For example, the date boxes in the month and day views were too crowded, displaying only two tasks or logs per day, which as one participant said, renders the calendar interface "nearly useless". Additionally, a user flow issue is the inability for a newly created event to auto-populate elsewhere in Food Safety. This forces users to duplicate the creation of these events in other parts of Food Safety, leading to frustration and an increased chance of user error.
Deliver
What I Delivered: Recommendations & Actionable Insights
Stakeholders received a comprehensive presentation that included detailed analysis of the findings, direct quotes from participants, and actionable insights and recommendations. This presentation aimed to clearly communicate the results of the study, highlight key issues, and propose practical solutions based on the research.
A few presentation slides from official Findings Report that I presented to the Business and Stakeholders.
I also provided fully anonymized video clips. These clips showed participants experiencing issues and their resulting feedback. These pieces of evidence helped stakeholders understand the impact of the findings and foster empathy for the participants' experiences.
Conclusion & Next Steps
After delivering the findings, the issues were prioritized and added to the backlog by the Food Safety PM based on severity. I then met with the Directors of Product, User Experience, and the Food Safety Product Manager to create a strategy. We identified quick wins that could be implemented immediately and long-term solutions to be addressed in the complete calendar redesign.
As a group, we decided to mandate the remediation of all high and medium issues in the redesign. We also chose to remediate all identified accessibility issues in the upcoming sprints, before the redesign.
This comprehensive generative study aimed to provide a thorough understanding of how users interact with the calendar feature, identify key areas for improvement, and inform a user-centered redesign that enhances functionality and user satisfaction.
Reflections: Project challenges That I Faced
As the sole UX researcher at Highland, my time and resources were occasionally diverted. Midway through this study, I had to pause to address an urgent priority, spending two weeks on another project. As a result, the completion of this study extended to a total of eight weeks.