Intro
Thomson Reuters is a leading provider of business information-enabled software and tools for legal, tax, accounting, trade and compliance professionals combined with the world's most global news service, Reuters.
Challenge
It was increasingly becoming evident that there was a need for a tool to check project progress internally. Clients needed transparency to track progress of their projects according to key milestones.
Solution
Because this tool was completely new and bespoke, it would need to be created from the ground up. It was necessary to work closely with the stakeholders to capture their requirements.
1. Introduction
For clients to check project progress at Thomson Reuters they would have to email or contact the project leader they were dealing with. There was no quick way to get transparency or an overview of how things were progressing. For project managers they would write down tasks and activities that they had to do and records of communication and meetings were archived and handled via Outlook. This resulted in inefficient use of time and added the risk of information loss.
A tool needed to be created to manage all work-related projects and allow project managers and clients to have access at all times. It would enable users to set goals with clear tasks, to schedule tasks, and to track their progress, so that ultimately everyone could be more productive as they worked towards completing the project.
2. User Research
A set of surveys and interviews were designed and conducted to get a better understanding of the users’ needs and behaviours for goal setting and task management. People who worked internally at Thomson Reuters and had experience with project management were chosen to participate.
The user research revealed core user needs in goal setting and task management. Overall, people reported the desire for a product that would not only help them stay organized and keep track of goals and tasks, but to be able to clearly see how tasks were related to goals and the progress they were making towards accomplishing the goals.
3. Competitor Analysis
A competitor analysis was conducted of popular apps and tools for task management. Through the analysis, some core features were identified, such as the ability to move items across goals, to collaborate with other users, and to assign due dates. Features that were missing from current products were also identified, such as targeted coaching on goal-setting, task prioritization, and an activity log.
4. Application Map
Informed by the research findings, a draft application map was created to organize content and features. Features that research participants indicated as important were prioritised, such as creating goals and tasks and having a calendar and reminders. The application map showed how these might relate to one another within the information architecture of the product.
Application map
5. Wireframing
The user research and application map informed the main screens that were developed in the first set of low-fidelity wireframes. Sketches were based on the content of the application map to keep track of the interactions that needed to be included in each screen. Focus was given to the core user needs that the research participants had emphasized they wanted, which included the desire for a simple, clean, and clear product navigation and an explicit connection between tasks and a calendar.
Please click the thumbnail below to see the wireframes in more detail.
6. Visual Design
After reviewing findings from the initial research phase, it was observed that many of the competitor products predominantly had blue colour palettes and evoked a sense of simplicity, informality, and friendliness. We experimented with colour palettes and typography that would convey some of the same values and characteristics as the competitor products, but would also convey reliability, productivity, efficiency, and organization, all of which, according to initial user research, were key for tools that supported task management.
In order to narrow down the choices of possible colour palettes, we went back to the participants for their input and found that they had the strongest preference for the palette that incorporated yellow, orange and blue. From there, we further refined the specific hues of the chosen palette in order to better reflect a sense of vibrancy and affirmative energy.
Armed with these new insights, 4 different designs were created. These were presented to the stakeholders for their feedback.
A few design options
7. Final Design
After several rounds of usability testing and iteration, the following high-fidelity composites of several of the pages were produced, which incorporated the branding and visual design of Thomson Reuters.
Final screen design
Final screen design
8. Conclusion
Working on this project had been a great learning experience and reinforced the importance of the user-centred design process. One of the biggest motivators in learning UX was the need to understand visual design and UI further in order to create interfaces with more ease and engagement.
Important takeaways from this project were:
As a designer, you can learn more from unstructured testing than formal goal setting tests.
Making higher fidelity prototypes may help with the users understanding of the concept, but may also increase frustrations when they can’t perform complex actions.
Understanding the problem and the users affected by the problem is more valuable than coming up with 'cool' solutions.
