CSR Assistant
A first of its kind Customer Relationship Management app. We made a cloud application to assist customer service reps with digital buying work at a global chemical corporation.
Case Study & Showcase
An enterprise app for efficient digital buying
Project Keywords
- Responsive Web App
- Desktop Research
- Digital Customer Service
- Enterprise Application
- Global Chemical Company
Timeline
Oct. 2021 - Dec. 2022
Platform
Enterprise Cloud Applicaton (Angular/Azure)
My Role
Sr. UI/UX Designer
My Role
While working for Avanade I was staffed as the Sr. UX/UI Design lead on a 9 member cross-functional work team. The scope of work included UI/UX design, research and visual design. I was an end-to-end contributor conducting research and translating those insights into design interactions with storyboards, wireframes, user flows. I also served as Visual and UI designer and I partnered with the Product Manager to manage backlog and release notes..
Skills
- User Interface Design
- User Experience Designer
- Interaction Design
- User Research
- Adobe XD
User Experience Design
User Interaface Design
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Research
Understanding system and business needs
This client did not allow our team to access to current employees who were CSRs, so I had to be creative about how to develop understanding about which pains were worth solving for the business.
Objective
Build Problem statments - CSRs overwhelmed and confused while managing digital buying
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Workflows varied among each of the 9 different global organizations.(Fractured collaboration)
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Knowledge transfer is inconsistent because veteran CSRs have their own way to do things. (Training Painful)
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Messy app library and lots of complexity. CSRs are often entry-level roles which adds difficulty to work experience. (Experience impacts bottom line)
Problem #1
In spite of limited buy-in from the client on the value of user research I used my own desktop research methods and some resourceful interviewing I was able to articulate the business problems and pains beyond what the client stakeholders shared.
Research plan for employee discovery
It was challenging to get direct access to the client’s current employees, but I created a plan that clarified the role of direct user research.
Results
Collected 40 employee insights. Created user mental models.
Problem #2
I built a journey map for the CSRs role in the digital buying process. I went to Glassdoor, indeed and Linkedin to learn about the sentiment which CSRs had about their job duties and their employee experience.
Journey map/ user story
Using data captured from workshops with real CSRs in a previous phase of the project, I made a map of the work experience to tell the user’s story.
Results
Guided the team through prioritizing 50+ features during backlog refinement. Created the journey map.
"Getting through my actual work is so much more complicated than training because I have to manage customer requests, online inquiries, as well as the supply chain pipeline."
-Janelle D., Customer Service RepsUse cases to address with my design
Resolving order blockers was a key task for the CSR role. Some of the order blockers were more rare than others, so it was hard to remember the steps to resolve, the meanings of codes and terminology and make decisions.
Online orders are direct to customer (D2C). These orders skip the sales rep layer. CSRs need high visibility and reminders to prioritize those orders.
The softwares learnability was poor. There were several different apps did the exact same things. Some were hard to use on smaller laptops, none of them were integrated with each other. None of the apps were designed for accessibility.
Interaction Design
Architecture user interactions from user insights
This client was a large complex enterprise. The outlook at the company was almost completely based on “system performance”. I relied upon team collaboration to make sure my ideas about represented human-centered design feasible solutions.
Approach
I translated user experience into design requirements with business and tech feasibility in mind. I am able to contribute to designing and building the final output from end to end. design implementation and build interactions from research insights.
InspirationWireframePresentationFeedbackCollect patterns & laws Test design ideas Share design story Iterate finer detail I focused the user experience on minimizing user learnability and make the build feasible. I build components and screens with boxes and lines to test the design. This is a collaborative step. I build a storyboard of each flow to show how the whole design matched with needs on the users journey. Collaborative communication is key to my approach, I rapidly design several versions and iterations in response to feedback. User Research outcomes
CSR Assistant
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User Interface Design
Designing screens and interactions
I created the base design system, component and screen design. I also did testing, presentation and design handoff to developers. Below are some of the more than 50 stories I worked on over the project.
Base design system
I built the interface from the ground up
Based on learning the CSR’s pains, I built the UI components and tokens in Adobe XD. I contributed as visual designer and interaction designer.
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Breakpoints and Screen size
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Color and Design Tokens
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Navigation and Footer
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Data refresh
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Core components
Research customer queries (Customer Support)
The business needed CSRs to support digital buying by identifying blockers for orders and helping customer clear them. I design interactions to help them research many orders on the fly in a single screen.
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Research Order Blockers
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Prioritize Tasks
Manage complex data all on 1 screen
Users dealing with so many sources of data and knowledge management all over the place, I designed a single screen to make it easier for CSRs to orchestrate the product pipeline. In future iterations we could then work on automating this work.
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Advanced Order filter
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Order inventory Downstream
Customize your own work tool
The user profile section and the settings area grew in function as we built more user stories into the app. I designed 3 iterations of the settings menu. We learned of important usability like supporting CSR groups and team mates, and helping to learn and prevent error states.
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App Settings menu (iterations)
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User profile menu and authentication
Employee Experience Features
CSRs had high turnover. Some reasons included the complexity and demands being put on entry level employees, inbox fatigue and stressful conflicting priorities. I designed new screens and full interaction storyboards for these experiences.
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Messaging & Alerts
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Custom priorities
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Automatic Product View
Improve user adoption
When the tool was released the business had 2 direct alternative tools for doing the same work. After soft launch we had to compete for users. I developed a concept for an interactive game to promote user adoption. I also designed a campaign around gathering user feedback.
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User tour Easter egg contest
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Feedback request form
Meet the First of its kind
CSR Assistant
Features -
