ROLE

UX Research

TEAM

Centeva

DURATION

2 Months

The Need

Our loyal client’s intranet (named NEAT) had been fulfilling basic needs for several years. And yet we sensed an opportunity to improve how team members published processes and consumed information, documents, training, policy, tools, and other content. We wanted to research and identify ways to significantly improve our clients’ ability to document processes and access team tools.

The Challenges

The intranet is an essential backbone tool for complex organizations. While our client had an existing system, we wanted to research and understand how we might modernize and improve the intranet to better support leaders and employees. How might users create and maintain access to enterprise tools and, therefore, get work done correctly and more efficiently?

The first challenge was updating our understanding of all the intranet’s users and their needs. On one hand, we needed to satisfy C- and Director-level executives access to updating processes and communicating effectively. On the other hand, team members needed effortless access to the most current processes and approved tools. All team members needed easy access to authoritative information about workflows and processes.

The Solutions

We would apply UX research best-practices to understand how the current system was useful, identify valuable improvement areas, and revisit our understanding of business processes. Research results would be vetted to outline how improvements would need to address both administration and team use.

Discovery

During the Discovery phase, I worked to understand and empathize by conducting research and gaining an updated understanding of our users’ needs and how they used the current system.

Diary Study

A diary study was used to gather information about how our end-users interacted with the existing product. During this period, study participants were asked to keep a diary about their use of the existing system. Users recorded why they visited the system and what activities they were or weren’t able to complete. These personal organic behavioral insights helped us gain a rich understanding of which areas of the current system were relied on within the current product and informed our next research task.

Contextual Inquiries

Following the initial diary study, we did Contextual Inquiries in order to observe the users of our system in their work environment. This helped us identify friction areas between the currently available features in the intranet versus current business practices. For example, one interviewee referred to binders filled with printouts rather than rely on the intranet’s search functionality.

The Deliverables

I delivered UX Research results and assessments to the Project Manager and design team. An Insights Report with a prioritized feature set offered the what and why for suggested improvement needed. We were able to validate that the current intranet was a useful tool that was currently utilized throughout the organization. We were also able to assess which areas were most heavily used, and which areas that had small and large bugs. Along with business use cases and UX research artifacts the Insight Report also included other helpful information.   

Prioritized Features

Quick Access: allow users to quickly access the right tool at the right time

1. Search: Investment in improving search result accuracy, with a special focus on document delivery

2. Admin Panel: ease of use for users adding documentation

Acceptance Criteria

To be accepted as a replacement for the existing intranet, the new system must offer a significant improvement. The system would need to meet certain Acceptance Criteria.

• Let team members quickly and easily access authoritative information about workflows and processes

• Provide consistent access to management-to-employee communication

• Maintain the features currently used (listed in report)

The Results

As the project timeline moved forward into the idea creation phase, our team was able to focus on improving the most important areas within the system. The improvements could focus on the features needed to modernized the internet and help stakeholders and end-users get their work done more accurately and efficiently than the current product.