Screen Door Labs
Project: Tablet / Mobile App Design
Client: Screen Door Labs
Duration: 3 Weeks
Team: Brenda Liu, Saif Edu, Christine Gale
Tools: Figma, Whiteboard, Post its, Pen and Paper, Sketch
My Role: UX Designer / Project Manager
About the Project
Screen Door Labs is a Los Angeles based start-up that is in the process of developing team communication software built to help first responders work safer, respond faster, and communicate better as a team.
The Objective
Design a command center tablet app that increases comprehension of emergency situations for fire Battalion Chiefs and Captains.
Discover
User Interviews
Market Research
Understanding Our Users
To gain a better understanding of our target audience, we interviewed 1 Battalion Chief and 4 Captains. These interviews taught us the motivations, frustrations and overarching goals of our target users.
Below are some key findings we uncovered:
Market Research
Analyzing competitor’s products gave us insight on the market. We identified feature trends in software applications that are currently being used; however, few provided updated, real time information.
Our main takeaways are as follows:
Few competitors implemented some sort of mapping feature
None of the competitors had more than 1-2 key features; therefore, first responders must switch between multiple applications in an emergency.
Define
Affinity Mapping
User Journey Map
User Persona
Affinity Mapping
To synthesize the data from our user interviews and identify key trends that existed, we created an affinity map.
We grouped our findings into categories to shape our understanding:
Communication
Current Tech Tools
Problems
Operations
Goals & Motivations
Visual Tools
User Journey Map and User Persona
Based on our user interviews, we developed a user journey map to highlight key actions, thoughts and emotions of a Battalion Chief when responding to a brush fire. To further inform us of our audience, we also created a user persona to help better understand the goals and motivations behind our target audience.
These deliverables identified the pain points and motivations where there were opportunities to provide a design solution.
Problem Statement
How might we prioritize communication and safety to help Battalion Chiefs gain better situational awareness?
Develop
Design Challenges
Design Studio
Design Challenges
As we began to ideate our design, we discovered an array of features that could be incorporated in our application. We limited those features to the minimal viable product (MVP) so that we wouldn’t overwhelm our users on initial launch.
To identify the most valuable features, we created feature prioritization charts. During this workshop, we discovered we would need to create a separate application for “boots on the ground” so that they could be tracked in the field.
Our feature findings from the chart are listed below.
Design Studio
After assessing our user needs and challenges, we developed low-fidelity wireframes in a design studio where we sketched as many ideas as possible. We then put our ideas together to create one cohesive design solution.
Deliver
User Testing
Wireframes
Prototype
User Testing
We conducted 3 usability tests with 1 battalion chief and 2 captains using our medium fidelity wireframes and prototype. Overall, participants struggled with learnability, but generally made more positive comments then negative ones.
Wireframes
We iterated on our designs based on our usability tests to create high fidelity wireframes. Specifically, we added simple, yet comprehensive onboarding screens.
Medium Fidelity Wireframes
High Fidelity Wireframes
High Fidelity Prototype
Play the videos below to see the prototype.
Next Steps
More testing and research will need to be done in order to evaluate the value of many of these additional features.
Features to Prioritize:
Tutorial Onboarding
Augmented Reality Mapping
Automatic New Case Generation