Big data UX, UI and IA

For the past three and a half years, Nimble Partners has worked with a big data company to design two suites of web and mobile-friendly applications investigating multiple aspects of the labor market, including demand, supply, job posting, job search, and career exploration. The applications serve a wide user base: job seekers of all ages and backgrounds, the state and local government officials assisting them, public- and private-sector employees researching labor market opportunities, and others.
We worked directly with customers, product management, and developers to redesign some applications, while building others entirely from scratch. Our work included both the customer-facing user experience as well as the tools administrators rely on daily to help job seekers and manage the applications. Customers were delighted with the results: one said we’d “nailed Jell-O to a tree.”

We provided:

• User experience conceptualization and design
• Information architecture
• User interface design
• Visual design
• User testing

We can't show this work publicly. Contact us for access to samples via our demo site.

Product strategy vs. UX strategy – thoughts from UXPA Boston 2014

Note: this post was updated June 10, 2014. I read Jeff Gothelf's post "There is no such thing as UX strategy" after seeing tweets about it a while ago, and didn't think too much about it. Recently, however, I've been thinking about how (and if) UX strategy manifests in UI design decisions, so I decided to attend the UXPA Boston 2014 conference session "UX Strategy exists, but what is it?" with this in mind.

Gothelf's post, which claims "[T]here is no such thing as UX strategy. There is only product strategy," inspired the session, moderated by Diana DeMarco Brown. It was great to hear stories from panelists Sarah Bloomer, Eva Kaniasty, and Lori Landesman. During Q&A, one attendee said he agreed with Gothelf, but unfortunately, there was not much time left to explore the statement. With a night to sleep on it, I realized that statement was crucial to helping me define my own thoughts on the topic.

To me, UX strategy is the goals and plan established for helping and delighting end-users, as well as meeting the needs of stakeholders, and in the case of enterprise applications, purchasers. Stakeholders and purchasers are types of users. My bias as a designer is to go the extra mile for end users – the people who use what I design. In the case of a consumer app, the user and the purchaser are the same, so in these situations I agree that product and UX strategy are the same. In the case of enterprise applications, user and purchaser goals and needs are often vastly different. Like so many answers to UX design questions, the answer to the question of whether UX strategy is different from product strategy is, "it depends." It depends on who your users are, who the organization is, and what the goals for the product are.

Focusing on the purchaser has led to dreadful and compromised enterprise application experiences. I've worked on enterprise applications for ATG (now Oracle), Endeca, (also now Oracle), and Curaspan, to name a few. In those cases, UX was part of product strategy, both functionally and conceptually. That in itself was not a problem. However, while stakeholders and product managers believed in UX, when it came down to coding and shipping, their focus was on meeting the needs of buyers. This makes sense given how enterprise product management success is measured – in sales, obviously. Like an oldest child in a family, enterprise product strategy takes up a disproportionate amount of stakeholders' time and attention. UX is the younger sibling, wanted and adored, but left to its own devices due to the focus on the oldest child. With intermittent support, UX for enterprise applications often lacks the resources it needs to sustain it and help it thrive.

Follow up note - June 10, 2014: With more thought and reading, I want to add that I think enterprise product strategy can be the same as UX strategy, it is just that it often isn't. If/when enterprise product strategy focuses on providing value to purchasers by developing software that is designed to succeed by helping the people who use the applications do so effectively, efficiently, and with appropriate delight, product strategy is aligned with and subsumes UX strategy.

This brings up more questions: are stakeholder and purchaser needs for enterprise applications really so different from end users, and if so, why? Also, if business stakeholders and product purchasers are types of users (as I consider them to be), then is the discussion of UX vs. product strategy really about end user-focused strategy vs. stakeholder and purchaser-focused strategy specifically in the realm of enterprise applications?

Juniper internal app research & concept

Juniper Networks uses multiple internal tools to keep track of sales-related technical documentation. In an effort to consolidate those tools, Juniper approached us to design a proof-of-concept for a new, mobile-friendly application. We interviewed sales engineers as well as the people who manage and support them to understand the different situations and patterns of use. Based on those interviews, we designed multiple approaches for an intuitive, intelligent, and responsive search interface that guided users to the most recent and relevant information.

Work included:

• User research
• UX design

4INFO admin UI design

4INFO, a mobile ad delivery and analytics company, needed help evaluating a mobile ad campaign management platform's alpha interface for potential UX design issues. Nimble Partners reviewed the interface in progress and honed its feature set and application flow through multiple rounds of discussion and wireframing. We also designed visuals for the application and consulted with the development team as they applied the new look and feel.

Work included:

• UI and UX analysis and design
• Wireframing
• Visual design

Wireframes for campaign page (top) and campaign edit flow (bottom)

Visual designs for campaign page (top) and campaign edit flow (bottom)

Application color usage guide

Endeca (now Oracle) product admin UI design

Endeca, a search and business intelligence software company, wanted interface and user experience design expertise to ensure a new set of administrative features was both easy to learn and effective for complex tasks.

We collaborated with Endeca's engineers to define new features, flows, and interface options that serve the client and partner engineers who develop reporting and analytics applications for business users. Working on-site and participating in Endeca's Agile development cycle, we iterated and refined options and pathways through paper prototypes, and created final annotated wireframes, visuals, and design standards for the developers to implement using Flex.

Work included:

• User interface and user experience design
• Wireframing
• Visual design and design standards
• Usability test plan

coverleaf.com digital magazine marketplace

In a rapidly changing market, Texterity, Inc. (now part of GTxcel) saw an opportunity to engage readers with digital editions of print magazines online. We helped define, visualize, and create what that would be: coverleaf.com, a site for magazine enthusiasts to explore, purchase, save, and share digital magazine content.

We designed the coverleaf.com beta site, launch site, and identity, and consulted on UX as the business model evolved.

We provided:

• Stakeholder workshop
• UX design
• Paper prototype development and testing
• Identity design
• Visual and UI design
• Specifications for developers

Home page

Magazine detail page

My Stuff area for clipping, saving, and sharing magazines

Texterity digital magazine reader design

After designing digital magazine site coverleaf.com with Texterity, Inc. (now part of GTxcel), we worked with them to improve their e-Reader user experience and UI.

Keeping business goals and what we learned watching people use the Reader in mind, we defined a strategy for the redesign effort, and worked with the team through launch and beyond.

We provided:

• Project charter
• Visual and UI design
• Specifications for developers
• Usability testing advising

Magazine cover in Reader

Sharing content in Reader