Reinventing data-mangement system for local nonprofit
Cell Dogs
problem statement
Cell Dogs, a non-profit based out of Southern California, needed a more efficient way to manage their rapidly growing data records instead of their standard spreadsheet tracking system.
approach
My team and I used competitive analysis and customer profiles to better inform our decision around the product requirements. We then used Figma to visually design the product and did validation testing to ensure client satisfaction.
project summary
My Role
Team
Dates
Tools​
Client
Product Designer
5 Product Designers
Sept 2022 - April 2023
Figma, FigJam
Cell Dogs
UCI Commit the Change
outcome
After handing off the prototype to the developers, our clients​ were able to begin using the product and were able to cut down their time to search for information in half.
overview
table of contents
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This case study project summarizes a project between UCI's Commit the Change and a non-profit organization called Cell Dogs. Cell Dogs assists the rehabilitation of adults and juveniles in correctional facilities, by giving them the opportunity to train rescued dogs.​
We worked with the clients to design a new program for them to streamline the way that they keep track of the dogs as well as the inmates. We spent seven months to create this program from the ideation to its final iteration.
01
scope
At the initial meeting with the clients, our priority was to clearly understand what our clients's main goal was for this project. This included understanding their requirements were, their nice to haves, and investigating what their major pain points were.
Who are our clients and their goals?
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Non-profit that assists the rehabilitation of adults and juveniles in correctional facilities, by giving them the opportunity to train rescued dogs
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Goal: Create a solution to better catalog their past data on correctional facilities and their dogs
What are the product requirements listed by our clients?
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Create a website based application to visualize data
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Support Cell Dog administration in the process of planning according to where dogs are located
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Make it easy to create, update, delete, and read data about each dog and the jail it went to
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Ensure that the data is secure from all ends
How do we define the users of the product?
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Users will only be the administration of Cell Dogs
What tools can we use to build a strong user-experience for our clients?
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Information Architecture
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Competitive Analysis
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Customer Profiles
information architecture
After understanding the product requirements, my team and I organized the information architecture to figure out what is the best method to arrange all of the necessary pages. One of the points that we kept in mind while creating the information architecture is how to divide the main two data sets, the jails as well as the dogs. We also needed to consider how many pages were needed for internal housekeeping such as user management and account creation.
competitive analysis
We compared the problems and needs of our clients to other similar products, especially those that required users to enter and manage many pieces of data. We researched platforms including Airtable, Notion, and Intuit Quickbooks. It gave us insight into possible functions that we could include in our own product. We evaluated the similarities to our project requirements, product advantages and product disadvantages.
From these four products we analyzed, we identified some design opportunities that might support the goals that our data management system might employ. These included color coded chips, modular data breakdowns, analytics and profile viewing, as well as list organization.
customer profiles
The next step in our User Research was to create customer profiles. I created two profiles to mirror who would be using this application. I decided on creating two profiles as opposed to personas because there are only two main users of our application, the director and the manager. Mapping the pain points allowed us to see which of the moments in the journey required the most attention from our team when implementing the design decisions into the software.​
key takeaways
Users prioritize efficiency in navigation​
high utilization of filter and sort functions on spreadsheets
product should be flexible and dynamic
users value simplicity in visual design choices
02
design system
We used Cell Dog's existing brand colors, typography, and logo for our design.
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Our team also decided to use the Chakra UI Figma Kit to standardize design and streamline the process for developer hand-off. ​All of the components, including the colored tags, buttons, and icons were a part of this UI Kit.
03
wireframing
The creation of the low-fidelity frames was a smooth and easy process. We used a whiteboard for the original drawings to do a rough sketch of our navigation bar. We also took this time to decide which pages would better suit using card style, tabs style, or lists to display information. After the sketching on the white board, we made a digital version of the frames on a tablet drawing app to make it more accessible for the team to access.
low fidelity wireframes
high fidelity wireframes
We have finally reached the phase to iterate over high-fidelity frames. The following slides showcases the key features we incorporated as we went through the process of wireframing.
04
validation testing
We needed to then show the prototypes to our clients to see what changes were necessary to be made. We used the results to justify whether or not the design was user-friendly and whether there were any changes they required.
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client feedback & incorporation
"This is going to be a lot more efficient than our Excels and keeping track of those files"
Hanna, Marketing Manager
"It's really great overall! It makes it a lot easier to look for certain dogs more quickly now"
Janette, Executive Director
a sweet thank you video from our clients
Personal Takeaways
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Be well prepared when working with clients. When working directly with clients, it is very important that you are prepared to answer any questions and concerns that they have. You are working with them to create the best product you can, so treating them as a partner yields stronger outcomes. ​
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Teamwork makes the dream work. During this project, I was very grateful to have such a well-rounded team working with me. I was able to learn from them and their design processes. Doing design with a group is super beneficial because it teaches me to be more creative and to see the alternatives to the design solutions that I normally would default to.
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The easier the better. When designing, the main rule of thumb is to design for simplicity. One of the main themes that we wanted to keep while designing was to keep everything easy to read. There are a lot of different sets of data that we need to manage when making this program. We asked ourselves how can we incorporate color, pages, and tabs.