Web Based Automated Nurse Scheduling Software
The Client:
Medecipher is a healthtech startup based in Golden, Colorado. Their product is nurse scheduling software that effectively predicts patient censuses and thereby staffing needs, directly addressing scheduling shortages and overages, and balancing staff skills and education to provide the best patient care possible.
The Problem:
In January 2023 the product was in still early stage development and had never had a UX Designer on staff. The team had originally created the GUI to be used by internal employees in a consultative capacity with hospital administrator. After realizing that consultative user would greatly slow down the scaling of the company, the need for end users to handle the product directly became apparent. As the Medecipher team recognised the shortcoming of the then current design, it was understood that a complete redesign would be necessary and that user experience expertise would be required to reinvent the product.
The Solution:
Given the change in the product’s purpose, the goal of the redesign would be to make the product more intuitive, more aesthetically pleasing, and able to be used independently and effortlessly by the intended audience. The needed changes included:
Create a logical and chronological experience for users to create a schedule
Add data visualization and reports to inform users of the effects of their choices on scheduling outcomes and allow them to make data-informed decisions
GUI feedback to indicate where/why errors occur, and how to ameliorate those errors including instructional text, tool tips, deletion warnings etc.
(Future state) Building user flow for individual logins, as the product had a common login and no flow for a client to setup and view their own data
Project Duration: 1 year
My Role: Sole UX Designer & *Scrum Master
*Became interim Product Owner/Scrum Master while CTO was out on paternity leave but remained in these capacities while on this team. Helped to build processes and procedures to reduce tech debt, increase efficiency and have common practices for cross functional implementation of features.
01 RESEARCH & DISCOVERY
Mention here the need for primary research from the start-but was focused on gaining domain knowledge and beginning design…looking back a lesson learned is not following through earlier on this…ironically it’s how I would have gained more domain knowledge …
However I did spend lots of time with the product, asking questions,
What type of research did you conduct to define the problem and the audience? Explain the methods you used:
Company research and familiarizing myself with the needs and challenges of nurse scheduling
Understanding all aspects of a highly complex product
Working with engineers and data scientists understand how design is implemented and what causes differences in implementation between design and the GUI
Did you conduct interviews? If so, what were some of the interview questions you asked? How did you conduct the interviews? In person or remote?
Competitor Analysis
02 DEFINE
What was your process from start to completion? Did you take a linear approach — completing each segment and then moving on to the next? Or did you take an iterative approach — create, test, and change based on feedback?
What deliverables did you create? Who were your final personas? How is your sitemap laid out? What are the user flows for the project?
Share your assets — or create new ones that fit the information and flow of your case study while being concise.
The step of ‘Defining’ wasn’t done at one moment in the design
It was done throughout the process since I was designing from the start
Different tools have been helpful at different moments
Assisting team decision making (comparison chart)
Personas for defining which features to develop when : we needed to define and build our MVP before we should start spending resources towards new persona users which would have different interfaces
*relates to the importance of a roadmap, my product owner training, prioritization, etc
User flow was utilized when developing user feedback since there were so many needs, so many potential errors, and needs for different styles of feedback ie required fields, ETL/Uploads, site navigation, etc
03 DESIGN & DEVELOP
Did you create different versions of the designs, sketches, or wireframes?
Every week I had to present ideas to the team in a weekly Design Meeting. At times, this was showing ideas or first iterations to see if designs were valid per the backend/data science needs, other times this meeting was spent refining designs at the 3rd or 4th iteration after receiving feedback and updating the design, yet other times I was guiding review of implementations to again assure validity for all business aspects in my Product Owner role.
In addition to the weekly design meeting and iteration on specific designs, I also undertook a series of reviews that greatly aided the user friendliness of the product overt time.
What I learned here is the complexity of each piece! I began with an assessment of language, which turned into design/ ui kit, then error feedback and validation…these steps were necessary to building consistency within the product, but difficult to maintain in a situation where anyone can and does write tickets for a variety of aspects in the tool. It became my job to maintain consistency across elements and to hopefully get others thinking about the same
Branding already existed for this product- though there were efforts to improve and refine this especially in how colors and elements were implemented within the GUI. For ex) “reset” button, or light grays that were too light to read
Branding adjustments included a color accessibility assessment,language review, icon review, font review, CSS review in general (ie eliminating black strokes and shadows on buttons, consistency in font usage even on different pages, branding for errors (icons, colors, alerts)
What was the branding process? What were the final branding elements?
What color palette did you select? Why?
The only adjustment here was to adjust the gray for readability and also add a color for alerts/warnings/errors which was difficult to come to consensus on. Does “that red” need to be in the palette or not? Where can adjustments of current colors be used rather than introducing a new “violent” red color? ex) a thick teal stroke to indicate a required field rather than a bright red one?
What were the final deliverables for sketches, wireframes, UI design, and branding?
- I had to present my designs each week at a design meeting and receive feedback from the C-suite as well as the development team. At times, final deliverables were not defined, but designs endured weeks of feedback to arrive at an approved state where implementation could begin.
What was your favorite part of the design process? Wireframing, polishing the UI, etc.?
At Medecipher, I really enjoyed the process of design. I enjoyed learning how to ask the right questions to elicit feedback from my team–especially the quiet members. I enjoyed learning about the whole implementation process and how CSS/HTMLor the backend or data models might cause limitations and how to work with the team to create designs that could work for everyone–users and developers alike.
What type of testing did you conduct during the project? Describe your methods and how you executed them.
Usability testing with a nurse scheduling consultant revealed…
Did you test wireframes? Did you only test visual design? Did you create a prototype? If so, did you utilize it for testing?
Many designs were already implemented by the development team and therefore we were able to test the live app. Ironically this revealed further needs as our user chose Edge as her browser, which none of us had used, and additional complications arose
Be sure the prototype is live and functional at all times.
How did your insights from testing contribute to the final deliverables?
04 TEST & DELIVER
05 CONCLUSION
Summarize your insights of the project in its entirety. What challenges did you face? What did you learn from the process? How can it inform the work you do in the future? What could you have done differently?
What next steps would you take to further improve the project? What other key takeaways should potential employers know about? What are you most proud of?