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Go and explore our prototype

Client: City of Kingston

Role: UX researcher & UX designer (Layout, Colour Theme, Wireframe, Prototype)

Timeline: 14 Weeks

UX Methods Used / Tools: Literature Review, IA Diagram, Survey, Interviews, Focus Groups, Quantitative and Qualitative Data Analysis, A/B testing, Feedback Driven Iterations, Wireframes, Prototyping, Figma

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Background / Problem

Kingnet, Kingston City's in-house intranet, is used daily by employees in all fields. However, most employees who use the in-house intranet say it is inconvenient due to old articles and inefficient navigation systems. Problems such as old news, unnecessary navigation, redundant menus, and a mixture of information have led to employees not using the intranet often.

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Current KingNet Homepage

 

User & Business goal

Improving internal communication: An intranet can provide employees a central location to access company news, updates, and announcements. It can also include tools for real-time messaging, video conferencing, and other forms of communication that can help employees stay connected and informed.
Enhancing collaboration: An intranet can provide employees with tools for sharing files, collaborating on documents, and working together on projects. This can help to improve teamwork and productivity within an organization.

Streamlining processes: An intranet can provide employees with access to resources and tools to help them complete their work more efficiently. For example, it can include workflows for common business processes, self-service portals for HR and IT requests, and other tools that can help to reduce administrative overhead.

Increasing employee engagement: An intranet can provide employees with a sense of community and help to foster a positive company culture. By providing employees with access to resources and tools that help them do their jobs better, an intranet can also help to increase job satisfaction and engagement.

Accessing information: An intranet can provide employees with a central location where they can access information about company policies, procedures, and guidelines. This can help employees to better understand their roles and responsibilities within the organization.

Completing tasks: An intranet can provide employees with tools and resources that help them complete their work more efficiently. For example, it might include workflows for common business processes, self-service portals for HR and IT requests, and other tools that can help to reduce administrative overhead.

Collaborating with colleagues: An intranet can provide employees with tools for sharing files, collaborating on documents, and working together on projects. This can help to improve teamwork and productivity within an organization. Staying informed: An intranet can provide employees with access to company news, updates, and announcements. It can also include tools for real-time messaging, video conferencing, and other forms of communication that can help employees stay connected and informed.

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Project  Process

This project can be largely divided into four phases. In the first phase, I did various kinds of research and data analysis, and with the insights gained from this, I created a low-fidelity wireframe in Phase 2. In Phase 3, I conducted internal reviews with UX colleagues and collected feedback on wireframes through Feedback sessions with the City of Kingston officials. This user feedback was reflected in the Prototype in Phase 4.

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Research / Data Gathering

1) Literature review

I looked for best practices in various intranet portals, analyzed current trends and key features of the intranet, and analyzed what factors allowed users to be loyal to the intranet.

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2) Survey: An online survey consisting of seventeen (17) questions that gather both qualitative and quantitative data from the target audience. The link to the survey was sent out via email to twenty (20) hand-picked employees in management roles.

 

 

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3) Interview: I conducted online interviews with six of Kingston City's employees.
A total of six users were reviewed, including three Communications and Public Engagement, two Facilities Management and Construction Services, and one corporate service, 11 questions were interviewed at the manager level, and 15 questions were interviewed to front-line workers for each role.

- Interview result : 

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Data Analysis

The collected data were analyzed in the following way.
Data Organization and Preparation: Missing values, outliers, and inconsistencies of two Notetakers were identified and resolved appropriately by attribution or removal. Data formats were standardized if necessary (e.g., text responses were converted to numerical scales).

Description Analysis: In the case of online surveys, quantitative analysis was possible because Google Forms was used, and the distribution of responses was identified by visualizing data using pie charts.
Qualitative Analysis: Qualitative analysis techniques such as thematic analysis, content analysis, or narrative analysis were considered for interview transcripts and qualitative questionnaire responses.
Consolidate findings: The results of various data sources were compared and compared, and patterns or inconsistencies between data sources were sought.

Key insights from various research

Through various research methods, key insights into which pages employees frequently use the intranet and what their needs are for the intranet have been gained.

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For Home page

People still get information like job postings despite the old content of the intranet, but what the intranet wants is that they also want to quickly go to the page they want to see and get it right away. The City of Kingston employees also want to communicate with their colleagues internally. Therefore, I noted that the website should show the space to find a job, quick access buttons to execute functions or quickly navigate to the desired page, and the latest news.

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For News page

Through literature research and best practices, I was able to understand the latest intranet trends and how users use them. The news page is a must-have because it is a space where you can optimize the latest news, related technology trends, and the latest information about your field of work among the various functions and pages that the intranet must possess. I decided to organize ideas and wireframes for this news page, focusing on presenting the latest content by dividing sections based on the information people want to obtain by content type.

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For My profile page

People still get information like job postings despite the old content of the intranet, but what the intranet wants is that they also want to quickly go to the page they want to see and get it right away. The City of Kingston employees also want to communicate with their colleagues internally. Therefore, I noted that the website should show the space to find a job, quick access buttons to execute functions or quickly navigate to the desired page, and the latest news.

 

Ideation / Sketch : 

The idea sketch was conducted by all team members based on Insight obtained through various surveys such as literature reviews, best practices, online surveys, and interviews.

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                                        Home page                                                                   Profile page                                                                    News page

           Sketched by Hailey Kim

 

1st Wireframing : 

Homepage: I have created two types of homepages: one that shows all the latest information in dashboard style, and provides shortcuts and customizations for other pages. The other provides the user with the option to display what they want instead of providing a simpler style of homepages and a preset, such as Dashboard.

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Home page Proposal A                                                                               Home page Proposal B

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News page: News Page: The Hero screen on the news page got the idea to post an Announcement of the City of Kingston, or some of the most talked-about recent news, and add filters or tags to the news search function.

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                                                                                                            News page

 

Profile page: My profile is a page where users themselves update their information, and a profile is someone else's information that any employee of the City of Kingston can view. To distinguish between the two, I decided to make My Profile full-screen and Profile pop-up.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Profile page

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Feedback Session:

1) Peer group evaluations: I had a feedback session with about 27 UX classmates who were working on the project together before receiving feedback from employees using the Kingston City intranet. In the session, I gained ideas and internal criticisms about the features that can be applied to the Dashboard, as well as insight into the relationship between the profile and My profile page, along with preferences for the two home page styles.

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Peer group evaluation

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2) A/B Testing with 27 classmates: I conducted an A/B test with a homepage that shows all the latest information in dashboard style and two types of homepages that provide shortcuts and customization for other pages. Of the 27 respondents, 17 voted in favor of the dashboard and decided to proceed with the wireframe with it.

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Peer group evaluation and A/B testing

 

3) Feedback from the employees in the City of Kingston:  All participants were excited about our design and mainly worried about how well the idea could work with the developers. With all the feedback and the result of A/B testing, I proceeded on our 2nd wireframe.

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2nd Wireframing : 

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                                               1st wireframe                                                                                                    ​2nd wireframe

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Prototyping

The high-fidelity prototype was held at the showcase event with five team members to share about 14 weeks of research and research process and results with the client, and was conducted for guests invited from universities and Kingston City. I received feedback from the client that the design is well-organized, comfortable, and goes well with the intranet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Detail Images

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Go and explore our prototype

 

Next Step

As the project progressed, I thought that the recruitment period should be extended to actively attract more participants. Holding more data will improve usability and strengthen user-intranet interactions.
To test users, a prototype developed in the next step must be used. In particular, it is important to evaluate and improve the design through user testing based on the feedback of general users. It is also proposed to add and improve a process to perform accessibility tests to ensure usability including all users, including the disabled. In addition, I would like to know how much information the City of Kingnet intranet will deliver to employees in the future and what their satisfaction will be. If user feedback is collected and reflected through more participants and various methods, it will be possible to increase the usability of Kingnet and provide satisfaction to employees.

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