PRODUCT

INTELLIVY is an online platform which focuses on micro-testing of marketplace products on Amazon. The customer base is mostly eCommerce sellers who want to optimize their product image or title with help of real customer feedback to up sell their listings.

GOALS

1. Improve the experience of the current platform and make it more intuitive by considering the bigger picture vs only focusing on specific areas. 
2. Complement the marketing and content team with a UX view on producing content for the onboarding process in a new format, e.g. tours and demos.

TASKS

• Review the current product and recommend quick fixes 
• Improve the information architecture
• Plan and moderate remote user testing, analyze video recordings
• Run co-creation workshops, create user journeys and screen flows
• Prototype product ideas, define new features and MVP,
• Define a UX vision, KPIs, roadmap and strategy

BENEFITS

Quick fixing of common usability issues, user feedback on concept ideas and first screens, high-fi wireframes for a product-first approach, awareness for different use cases and a clearer picture of user personas, recommendations for business strategy and mid term UX roadmap including MVP for new features and ideas.

GOALS:

Map the data engineering teams' user journeys with all steps and tools, emotional states and pain points to improve the product development process, mitigate risks for the company, and provide a better user experience for the data platform

TASKS:

• Workshop facilitation with focus groups from segmented personas in Miro

• Draft several data engineering teams user journeys in Miro

• Discuss journeys with data platform service team and gather feedback

• Visualize the user journeys in Figma using the company's design language

• Deliver the journeys in printable poster format to hang them up in the HelloFresh offices

First User Walkthrough

Testing the Decisions app in MS Teams myself as a new user. Commenting on screenshots to collect pain points and recommendations.

UXR Question Board

Creating an online whiteboard using MIRO to discuss user research goals and assumptions with the CTO and the project manager and decide on the best approach for user research and testing.

Interview guidelines

Creating a Google sheet to collect and discuss questions for usability tests, develop tasks and prepare qualitative interviews. Scheduling interviews for moderated and unmoderated test sessions with participants from UserTesting.com

Research results

Closely communicating with the team to share insights from test sessions in meetings with help of notes and video highlights. Creating user flows, a user assistance inventory, concept studies and wireframes to improve the onboarding experience.

GOAL 

Project based support of the department ?Future Technologie and Digitalization? for a client in the finance industry regarding User Experience to help with digital transformation of the company.

TASKS

• Strategic planning, operative tasks and communication of design activities, methods, and vision
• Business analysis of existing solutions to replace by integrated solutions
• UX workshops, trainings, user evaluation and prototyping 
• Requirements engineering and problem definition with help of in-depth interviews, focus groups, contextual inquiries
• Documentation of process flows, user flows, needs analysis from a user perspective
• Customer Journeys - status quo and future definition
• Co-Creation workshops to define and design an online self service tool and knowledge base for customer service and sales 
• Present results to stakeholder such as team leads and managers, development, sales, editors, users, UX/UI design colleagues
• Design and validate concepts with help of wireframes and interaktive prototypes

Main Tasks:

• Implement HCD process in agile development

• Train HCD methods and enable non-designers (developers and consultants) to think more customer-centric

• Identify inconsistent interaction pattern and components

Goals:

• Create one consistent software experience

• User centered mindset in teams

• Create a Design System including a pattern and component library 

Methods:

• Persona interviews

• Requirements engineering

• Ideation, concepts and prototyping

• Moderated user and usability testing

About BORM:

BORM-INFORMATIK AG is the leading provider of industry software for woodworking companies in Switzerland. BORM-INFORMATIK AG develops ERP systems for the planning and optimisation of processes that integrates PointLineCAD. www.borm.swiss

Challenge:

BormBusiness and EvoBusiness are flexible industry solutions that can be optimised for the customer's process. Individual solutions and UIs are implemented by business experts on project base, but the underlying core system had many technical restrictions.

While the development team applied basic agile methods and managed issues in JIRA, they had never worked with a Product, UX or UI Designer or User Researcher before. Many epics lacked a deeper business analysis.

Approach:

To onboard the company's main stakeholders (managing director, CEO, CTO, PO), I set up a workshop. Together we developed our ux vision of a CLEAR, CLEAN, and LOGICAL product. We agreed on a ux strategy from that I built a goal oriented roadmap.

A "BORM to be wild" logo helped me to communicate ux design activities in a smart way. Guiding principles should ensure that all UIs provide a consistent user experience.

Compact GOOGLE DESIGN SPRINT sessions with business experts helped my team not only to clarify requirements and draft business processes, but to learn a lot from each other and about our users.

From interviews with colleagues I understood that vague business requirements caused a lot of confusion. I invented a PROJECT POSTER with problem oriented questions to identify user groups, their needs, and tasks.

Methods and tools:

Compact GOOGLE DESIGN SPRINT sessions with business experts helped my team not only to clarify requirements and draft business processes, but to learn a lot from each other and about our users.

From interviews with colleagues I understood that vague business requirements caused a lot of confusion. I invented a PROJECT POSTER with problem oriented questions to identify user groups, their needs, and tasks. On top, that's a brief summary of what I did:

? writing assumption based user stories in JIRA

? creating comic style concepts in SAP SCENES

? creating user flows and wireframes in BALSAMIQ
? interactive prototyping in AXURE
? moderated user testing in LOOKBACK

? collaborate remotely with team and customers in MIRO

Results:

• a development process that integrates ux activities

• a ux vision, strategy, and roadmap for all BORM products

• regular user and usability testings to collect feedback

• continious software redesign

Für das Start-up-Programm INNOVATION THROUGH DIVERSITY der gemeinnützigen Organisation SINGA Switzerland habe ich TeilnehmerInnen mit Migrationshintergrund in kundenzentrierter Produktentwicklung gecoacht. In Workshops mit 6-10 SINGApreneurs habe ich die Konzepte für Personas and Customer Journeys vermittelt und gemeinsam mit den Ideengebern die individuellen Geschäftsideen weiter entwickelt. Für die Customer Journeys habe ich Templates in dem professionellen Service-Designer-Tool CUSTELLENCE bereit gestellt und wiederholt Feedback zu den Ergebnissen gegeben.

Sprache: Englisch

Ziele:

Die Crowdhouse AG bietet seit 2015 Miteigentum an Schweizer Immobilien über eine Web-Applikation. Um passende Liegenschaften wie Mehrfamilienhäuser zu finden, die das Fintech Start-up den Investoren vermitteln kann, wurde eine weitere Webseite gelauncht. Kernstück war ein Formular, mittels dem Hausbesitzer ihre Immobilie zum Verkauf anbieten können.

Nach der ersten Überarbeitung habe ich ein Experten-Review gemacht und Usability-Probleme aufgezeigt, Mittels inhouse user testing konnten weitere Probleme bei der Bedienung des Formulars und der Verständlichkeit der Inhalte aufgedeckt werden. Um die Website noch mehr an die Bedürfnisse der Zielgruppe auszurichten, habe ich Aktivitäten für qualitativen User Research gestartet und Interviews für Personas durchgeführt, und kollaborative Workshops angestossen, zum Beispiel ein Assumption Board als Grundlage für die Ideenfindung im Team und eine Customer Journey als Basis für die Optimierung des Kundenerlebnisses.

Als UX/UI Trainer habe ich in großen Europäischen Städten 3-5 tägige Schulungen für Designer, Entwickler, Projektmanager, Redakteure und UX/Usability Experten gegeben.

Die Inhalte wurden von mir individuell auf die Teilnehmerwünsche angepasst. Flexibel habe ich aus den vorhandenen Modulen die Trainingsinhalte zusammengestellt: eine Mischung aus Theorie und viel Praxis. Die Gruppengrösse variierte von 4-12 Teilnhemerinnen. Die Schulungen waren teils offen, teils inhouse bei Unternehmen.

Schwerpunkte:

• Design Thinking, Ideation, Sketching

• Lean und agile UX

• UX und Produkt-Strategie

• Stakeholder Management

• Prototytping

• User Testing

• Anbieter: XDi Experience Design Institute

• Sprache: Deutsch und Englisch

Mit der mobilen App Gardena Smart System können Besitzer ihren Rasenmäher-Roboter und die Gartenbewässerung bequem fernsteuern und unabhängig vom Ort und der Tageszeit Einstellungen vornehmen und Geräte überwachen, starten und stoppen.

Mit dem wachsenden Anbeot von Produkten der Gardena-Palette, die sich smart steuern lassen, wuchs auch die mobile App. Die Bedienung wurde unübersichtlich und Inhalte nicht für alle Zielgruppen relevant. Aufgrund fehlender Design-Richtlinien war die Oberfläche zudem in vielen Teilbereichen anders gestaltet, was zu Verwirrung und Ineffizient bei den Anwendern führte.

Nachdem ich Screenshots für eine Sitemap der gesamten App aufgenommen habe, wurde klar, wie viele Untermenüs und Abzweige es in der Informationsarchitektur  mittlerweile gab. Die Übersicht war nötig, um die Navigation zu vereinfachen und umzustrukturieren. Ebeneso wurden unterschiedliche Muster sichtbar, die nun vereinheitlicht und im UI Design modernisiert werden konnten. Die Integration neuer Funktionen und Zielgruppen machte zudem eine komplette Neu-Konzeption des Startbildschirms nötig.

Kaptio Travel ist eine Web Applikation für Reiseagenturen, um individuelle und Gruppenreisen zu organisieren und zu verwalten. Die Web App wurde auf dem Salesforce entwickelt und erweitert das CRM um branchenspezifische Funktionen. Neue Anforderungen der Kunden sollten möglichst nahtlos in die gewohnte Salesforce User Experience integriert werden.

Nach einer Bestandsaufnahme der Erweiterung habe ich die Oberflächen überarbeitet und umstrukturiert, um den Anwendern eine schnellere Navigation und einfachere Bedieunung zu ermöglichen. Mit einem Wizard konnte die fiktive Belegung von Zimmern durch Reisegruppen optimal abgebildet werden, bis die tatsächlichen Namen aller Reisenden bekannt waren. Einheiltiche Bedienmuster und Konventionen unterstützen die Reiseagenten bei der Erstellung von Angeboten und Plänen. 

• Konzeption von A/B-Tests und Personalisierungskampagnen­ für den Internetauftritt der Deutschen Bahn www.bahn.de

• Mitarbeit in einem interdisziplinären Team zur Conversion-Optimierung (CRO) im Content des Kunden­ 

• Analyse bestehender Inhalte hinsichtlich Usability und UX Design

• Feedback und Training für interne Redaktion

• Bildung von Hypothesen für A/B-Tests in Workshops

• Ausarbeiten der Testideen als Wireframes in Axure

• Ausformulierung von Kampagneninhalten für die jeweiligen Personalisierungs-/ Testingvarianten im CMS

• Auswahl von Bildmotiven, Recherche und Klärung der Bildrechte ­ 

Challenge: Die Webseite www.jugendpresse.de besteht bereits seit einigen Jahren, das derzeitige Design und die Navigationsstruktur stammen aus dem Jahr 2009. Viele Inhalte sind oft ebenso veraltet. Die Webseite ist mitlerweile sehr umfangreich und bedient viele verschiedenen Zielgruppen (z.B. Lehrer, Schüler, am Medienberuf interessierte, Multiplikatoren, ..). Die Domains www.schülerzeitung.de und www.politikorange.de sind im Design der Jugenpresse gehalten und in die Seiten der Jugendpresse eingebunden. Für bestimmte Themen gibt es eigene Webseite, z.B. für die Jugendmedientage.

My job: usability review, definition of personas, user stories, modern and user friendly concept for content and design

• Website UX conception

• Personas

• Customer workshop design

Challenges: The non profit association Mannheim sagt Ja! e.V. was founded in 2015 to support refugees and create a welcome culture. A simple word press website was created but soon outdated as everybody was busy with voluntary projects. A facebook group was released, growing fast with hundreds of new members monthly. The facebook channel is used to announce events, arrange and organize volunteer jobs. But information is hard to find on facebook. There is also no option to donate money online or become actually a member of the NGO.

Project: To make updating content easy for people who don’t have much digital experience, we decided to stick with word press. There was a lot of content existing, but it was not very well structured. There were almost no photos or illustrations in addition to the text, and the layout was not very attractive. A lot of content was expected to be updated and enhanced. The current word press template was not responsive at all, nor offering any modern ui design features.

My job: I started an online survey with members of the organization and talked to people about their wishes and needs. The feedback was that a website with more information about the NGO and it‘s activities was very welcomed. Pictures and photos were missed a lot. After we decided to relaunch the word press website, I chose a bootstrap template to support modern ui design shortcodes. First I created a prototype in Sketch to test the information architecture and play with the ui design. Then I published my first digital version online. Continuously existing content was restructured and new added, the usability improved and the emotional look and feel redesigned

UX Consultant, Concepter, Information Architect, Trainer

• Challenges: OB/CC is a full service web and media agency that develops websites and portals, shop systems and mobile apps. Connected to the local magazine`s publishing and printing company, OB//CC combines print with online marketing strategies to best reach communities.
  A lot of technically skilled developers work with OB//CC but ux know-how was missing. The goal of my 2-day inhouse workshop was to 1) skill-up the team with ux methods, 2) guide them through the conception process and 3) innovate ideas for the interaction and interface design of a mobile app.

• Project: The mobile app MoveCard is addressed to young people and comes with a digital version of the established print magazine Move36. The digital discount card wants to attract consumers with special offers on location based services and guides them directly to the partner shop in town.

• My job: People learn best by actively applying new methods. Instead of creating a power point presentation, I was drawing important things on flipchart paper, using short texts and visuals. We didn?t use any digital tools during the workshop, and I was positively surprised how much developers liked my offline approach. Everybody was open to learn and explore new things. The 8-headed team followed me from creating a lean business canvas to drafting a persona named Shopping queen Sarah, collecting user tasks and developing the information architecure. Teams of two built a detailed paper protoype for every single screen of the app. Colleagues from the print magazin tested our very first version. Testing was not only a lot of fun but provided valuable feedback and new ideas to follow up. Later, a digital prototype was created from pictures of the paper screens in POP app. We prototyped OB//CC?s next project in a 3-day worskshop in October.

• Relaunching the wordpress website

• user research, prototyping & testing

• Challenges: 1 & 1 Telecommunication is an online distributer selling DSL and mobile phone contracts to private and business consumers. The main sales channel of the German based company is a big e-commerce website including a shop, offering a wide range of hardware and additional features (e.g. routers and online TV). The UI concepts for recurring marketing campaigns are created by several concepters, graphic and UI designers, while content managers are publishing them. To ensure consistency in layout, wording and design, a content managing system was implemented. UI patterns still had to be defined and to be developed as templates.

• My job: I started with an expert review on the online shop and order process to identify pain points and make recommendations. My feedback helped product managers and concepters to get new ideas how to improve the user experience. It also enabled developers to fix bugs. Next I selected a range of state of the art websites and apps to discuss current UX and UI design trends with shop managers and the UX team. Everybody was thankful for the inspiration, getting familiar with the human centered design approach, and to learn new methods. I developed a concept for an internal UX community to connect teams and promote projects. To enhance awareness for the user?s needs, I organized a workshop with product managers and did guerilla user research. From our insights I developed a persona and mapped a specific use case into a customer journey map. The result was an infographic that visualizes the emotional experience of young people when trying to find and sign an approbriate DSL contract, including touchpoints and ideas to improve each step. Finally I documented the content developement process to clarify responsiblities, roles and tasks.

• www.1und1.de

• Challenges: www.verivox.de is an online portal for consumers wher users can compare contract details of service providers such as telecommunication or power suppliers to sign the best and suitable contract. Because the internal usabilty engineer left the company and new features have not been tested since, I created an expert review for a relaunched section of the portal.

• My job: I tested three scenarios for desktop and smartphone and presented my feedback to the product and development team. From the result, a requirement list to fix bugs, redesign the UI and improve the interaction design was created internally.

• www.verivox.de

Achievement of my UX Designonline course with CareerFoundryIn this mentored online training I went through thewhole UX design process in 5 month:

Strategy & Content Analysis

UX Design thinking // UX role // User personas,information architecture & website content

Wireframing & Prototyping

UX best practices // Wireframes // Grid systems &responsive design // Testing ideas with users

Visual Design & Analytics

Elements of visual design // How to gather dataand use it // Continous testing & iterating

My Learnings

Covering the whole UX process, I designed my first web application called TASKLY. It was exciting to interview potential users, find out which features they require and discuss theideas that came up. Because a lot of project management tools for professional purpose – such as ASANA or BASECAMP – are successfully established, I decided to design my app for private users.Therefore I implemented so called project templates, for example to organize your wedding. Everytemplate consists of predefined tasks and is easy to customize. Users can export task lists and share and collaborate even with offline team members. TASKLY helps you to manage your personal dream project in a professional way!

• Challenges: End of 2013, SAP opened the Design and Co-Innovation Center (DCC) in the AppHaus Heidelberg. To promote their UX design services, the DCC team launched a new website.
  Therefore, appealing content was requested that attract potential customers. Regulary published success stories about cutomer projects, workshops and events hosted by the DCC became an important part of the content strategy.

• My job: As the whole DCC team – Design Thinking strategists, UX, interaction and UI designers – was obliged to report about their daily job, I created a Word template that made all stories consistent in language, content and design. In close collaboration with the marketing team a styleguide was created and roles and tasks have been defined. Doing so we ensured that everybody knows what to do when – including the customer that was interviewed and needed to sign-off the story.
  Additionaly to writing success stories, I documented Design Thinking workshops and illustrated my text with event photographs to capture the atmosphere. I also blogged about UX related events.

• Challenges: Tooltips, labels and messages are an integrated part of the UI, and one of my tasks as a Senior Information Developer was to review UI texts and messages. Even SAP’s UI5 based web applications come with a modern and beautiful design, many users asked for further information how to actually work with the tool. Our team of information developers convinced the product owner that the UI might not be such intuitive as expected and designed a context sensitive help concept. In close collaboration with UX designers and a people centric approach in mind, we developed an additional layer that offers help directly on the screen whenever users need support.

• My job: To find out what information users expect, we sent out a questionnaire to beta version testers. The feedback was overwhelming.

• We analysed the pain points, and based on our findings
  we did not only add contextual information but also task descriptions that help users to achieve their business goals. Whenever required, we came up with ideas to simplify the interaction design.
  In my role as a project coordinator I managed a team of information developers located in Germany, U.K. and Canada. Our agile development teams have been located around the globe. Communicating with people across many cultures and timezones has been a big challenge. Creating a wiki was crucial to exchange information and to make decisions transparent.

• My challenges: The main challenge beside understanding how the software actually works is to know your target group. SAP’s documentation deliverables must enable many different users – for example, IT consultants, system administrators and key users – doing their job. Who are these people, what do they want to achieve, and what do they know already? Interviewing stakeholders such as solution managers, developers and real users helped me to understand their goals.

• My job: My tasks as an Information Developer comprised defining the terminology, reviewing UI texts and creating guides that are usually published online: You can access thousands of pages of documentation for a wide range of SAP solutions, such as SAP for Banking, in several languages on the internet. Migrating content from Word to XML and restructure topics and guides according to the new information architecture and authoring guidelines has always been a big part of my job. Instead of simply describing features following the software’s architecture, I created content along user stories. I always tried to structure related topics according to the main business processes and tasks. Whenever I struggled to describe a workflow so it’s easy to understand, I proposed my ideas to restructure a screen and tried to convince developers to revise their design. As an author I have often been the first user and tester. Asking many people for feedback has always been a good approach, not only to improve text, but also the user interface.