Igors worked on

Guiding people in making forms

A form builder that helps create well-designed forms and integrate them with the issue tracking system of the user’s choice.

Year
Role
Research
Stakeholder interviews, front-line collaboration, information architecture study.
Synthesis
Sensemaking workshops, conceptual model, journey mapping, scenarios
Prototyping
UI design, integration prototype.
Evaluation & validation
Product analytics, usability testing.
Follow-through
Product & design strategy, product roadmap, development cycle coupling.

Problems solved

Make sure the resulting forms are good ðŸ™„

Good forms are notoriously tricky to implement. Our goal was to design this process in a way that doesn't require the know-how on the user’s part.

Help people creating forms think in user-centric terms

In addition to the intricacies of form design, it was crucial to make the form creators see their users' perspective. Embedded user-centeredness!

Ensure discoverability

Navigation had to support all the variety of things and concepts that can be found in a large multinational organisation.

Reducing the load on support agents

Support can be one of the largest budget items, especially when they operate on a global scale. Form builder helps to shrink that cost by improving agent velocity—and in turn, creating happier employees.

Who we designed for

Woman working
Photo by Brooke Cagle

Support1 agent, formcreator

Are responsible for creating, sustaining and improving a particular process, as well as, being responsible for the outcomes of the process. They need a way to manage incoming requests.

People working
Photo by Amy Hirschi

Employee, end-user of the form

Has a task and needs support in achieving it. Can be a person or a group's representative. In order to get support, they need to find the right way to get it.

Design highlights

Understanding context

The application of which the constructor is a part of is only a phase in the more general journey people in the company embark on when they need support with something. Acknowledgement of this by the team was important for a better understanding of where our users come from and what happens after they fill out their forms.

We built our team's understanding of the territory by mapping out the broader context. That helped achieve clarity and alignment around goals for the project, expectations, and potential dependencies and concerns. Stakeholder interviews further developed & broadened this understanding.

Form builder withing the broader context
Overview of the end-user journey and form builder's place within it.

Topic definition

Finding the right form was one of the biggest pain points for the previous reincarnation of the app and our goal was to make it easier to do. To achieve this we needed to make sure our users name and organize their forms in a way that their respective users can relate to.

The job of defining the topic of the form is divided between its title and the combination of tags. There are two parts to the form's definition: the immediate "topic" at hand and the broader "subject" space within which the process takes place. E.g. in "new user in HR system" the "new user" will be a topic and the "HR system" – its context that distinguishes it from other forms dedicated to the creation of users. It was important to build our search to understand different combinations between the two.2

At the same time by phrasing our questions in a goal-oriented manner that reminded the future use we nudged our users to imagine how colleagues will look for their form.

Question configuration UI
Question configuration UI

Progressive disclosure in question configuration

Processes our colleagues support vary greatly in complexity and this reflected directly in the complexity of their forms. Mostly they are a simple combination of two to three simple questions but once in a while, you come across something less straightforward.

Question configuration UI
Selecting the block type.
Question configuration UI
Form element names are chosen according to expected input, not UI it will be rendered with. Not what user will see but what you expect from them in return. Input field becomes Text; Checkbox—Yes/No; Date picker becomes Date. Additionally, choices were rendered either as radio buttons, checkboxes or dropdown menu based on the number of options.
Question configuration UI
When an answer option is known to be the most frequently selected one, it is helpful to select it by default. But defaults are tricky things - they're super useful but can be risky too. People tend to stick with whatever's already selected, which can nudge them down a certain path. We made sure to warn our users about this.
Question configuration UI
Adding an explanation.
Question configuration UI
Questions differ in complexity. Some answer themselves. Others benefit from examples, descriptions and nudges.

Roadmap planning

I participated in the product roadmap planning cycle by highlighting user needs and the state of the team’s current response to those needs: gaps, opportunities, and blindspots. Helped team members frame their work around the problems that need to be solved rather than the specific features they want to build.

Kano modelling was used for prioritisation of new features. Being limited in resources, our focus was on serving our users' basic expectations, to make sure there’s nothing they’re missing. Still, I was always on the lookout for inexpensive ways to add a moment of delight.

Outcomes

for support agents

The new interface improved the overall experience and user satisfaction. User feedback & data we gathered confirmed improved usability.

for the rest of the employees

Metrics and feedback tells a pretty good story - most users find the form right away on their first try. Looking at how quickly they fill it out and how few mistakes they make, it seems like they're breezing through without much trouble or frustration.