UX/UI Design
Group Project
Develop a tool to streamline construction projects for industry professionals, helping them plan, coordinate, communicate, and visualize their work.
Timeline
4 Months
Role
UX/UI Designer
UX Researcher
Team
Ali Brown
Martha Brain
Maeve Drynan
Emma Beatty
RTI Mentors
Tools
Figma
Unsplash
Mural
view the prototype
Design Challenge
How can we genuinely address the demand for affordable, available, and suitable housing?
Our group received a design challenge from Red Thread Innovations to develop a solution with global impact and present it to the company. After brainstorming and using a feasibility chart, we identified four opportunities spaces.
Area of Focus
Construction Tech: Streamlining Processes to Tackle Workforce Shortages.
We focused on Construction Tech (Streamlining Processes) to address the root cause of workforce shortages, narrowing our research to Ontario, Canada.
More than 80,000
construction retirements in the next decade in Ontario alone.
Need to fill 118,900
positions in the construction industry by 2033.
3.5 million more
homes need to be built by 2030 to reach affordability.
What didn't work
Finding Suitable Housing (rentals and roommates)
We ruled it out due to significant regulatory barriers that made implementation complex and challenging on a broader scale.
Alternative Housing (tiny homes, vans, and co-living)
We deemed it impractical for most people due to its limited feasibility and lack of accessibility on a larger scale.
Promoting Construction Careers (Marketing)
Industry recruitment felt less impactful, as we believed the issue went beyond simply increasing the workforce.
Primary Research
Industry interviews reveal communication gaps, delays, and poor document management
After choosing our focus area, we began interviewing professionals to understand their daily challenges and frustrations that can hinder project completion. We interviewed five individuals, including project managers, architects, project controls analysts, and lead carpenters.
These insights shifted our perspective. The problem isn’t just about increasing the workforce but addressing bottleneck obstacles to improve workflows between on-site and in office departments working on the same project.
UX Challenge
How might we streamline residential construction processes to improve productivity, ensure timely project completion, and address housing insecurity?
Target Audience
Project managers oversee multiple departments and need effective communication and budgeting tools to keep projects on schedule.
Our persona primarily focuses on Emily, the project manager. This choice takes into account both small and large construction projects that companies may have, which require someone to oversee all other departments. Therefore, we designed the prototypes with a project manager in mind, considering their experience and needs.
Pain Point #1
Breakdowns in communication
Pain Point #2
Complicated management tools
Pain Point #3
Inefficient budget tracking tools
Competitor Analysis
Construction management tools have usability issues and don't address varying tech skills in the workforce.
I conducted our group’s competitor analysis and examined the key features of our competitors software platforms . There are notable usability issues including non user-friendly tools for different skill levels and offer poor adaptability for on-site workers compared to people working in the office.
Design Process
Kicking off the designing phase with a crazy 8’s brainstorming session.
We started the design phase with a brainstorming session to prioritize features, including a user-friendly dashboard for centralized project information, an intuitive task management system, and a budget tool to track expenses and prevent overspending. The simple interface accommodates varying tech skills and improves coordination between on-site and office teams.
Impact
The 4 industry professionals we tested with were pleased to upload documents, receive real-time updates, and automate tasks like generating change order forms.
Centralized Project Dashboard.
Intuitive Workflow Management.
Expense Tracker for Budget Control.
User testing
We conducted two rounds of user testing to gather valuable feedback.
This process helped us identify areas for improvement and refine the prototype for better usability. The insights allowed us to address user pain points and enhance the overall design.
Improvements to the workflow management.
Problem
Users felt that the extra steps required to create an issue for a task were unnecessary.
Solution
Simplified by allowing users to create an issue directly when viewing a task.
Improvements to the expense tracker.
Problem
Users were unaware of how to view the expanse that went overbudget.
Solution
Resolved this by creating a prominent banner at the top of the page.
Design Systems
We prioritize ensuring our project's user interface is accessible to all users, incorporating features that accommodate diverse needs.
Here is an example where color and text are both used to convey information.
All colours were checked to see if they passed colour contrast guidelines.
Centralized Project Dashboard
A robust dashboard system enables real-time project tracking to identify delays and issues.
Prominently features recently viewed construction projects at the top for quick and easy access.
Projects Summary
Last viewed
Config Apartments
Robert Downy Jr. Co.
Progress
Milestone 2
40%
On Time
Due Date
10/05/24
First Place Homes
Numan
Progress
Milestone 1
10%
Due Date
23/08/24
View all
Displays an overview of all upcoming tasks across various projects.
Config Apartments
Order new materials
5/10 subtasks complete
02/03/24
Config Apartments
Permits
5/10 subtasks complete
16/04/24
First place homes
Shipment
5/10 subtasks complete
23/04/24
View all
Tasks
Upcoming tasks
Intuitive Workflow Management
User-friendly task management platform for effective team coordination.
The management feature alerts the user to any issues with today's tasks.
The user can directly add an issue to a task, enabling them to quickly update everyone on its progress.
A pop-up issue panel appears on the right, allowing the user to provide details about the issue.
The panel allows the user to notify the project manager directly.
Expense Tracker for Budget Control.
Identify cost-saving opportunities, prevent overspending, and optimize resource allocation.
The banner notifies the user when an expense has exceeded the budget.
This screen indicates that the flooring material expense has exceeded the estimated budget.
The messaging panel enables quick communication with the client, notifying them of the expense.
The automated message suggestions helps quickly provide options for resolving the expense issue.
Reflection
Insights I’ve learned from this project.
This project was a valuable experience that helped me grow as a designer, explore a broad problem space, and collaborate effectively with my team. It strengthened my skills as a team member and UX/UI designer. With more time, we would refine the solution by adding project links to notifications, enhancing over-budget visibility, introducing a 'threshold' line on finance graphs, providing a financial overview on the dashboard, detailing actionable tasks in "Today’s Tasks," and adding signed document indicators.
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