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Workflow
| 2022 - 2023
Workflow - Automating business process
Most businesses have many manual tasks in their processes, different integrated systems and depending on the size of company, custom code making it all work. Workflow aims to automate as many processes as possible but from a higher level, orchestrate automations between different systems.
Learning about contexts around who builds and maintains business process automation
When we embarked on the journey to create Workflow, our new business process automation tool, we initially aimed to design a solution accessible to individuals with limited technical expertise. However, as we delved deeper, it became evident that our primary users would be IT Admins, Network Administrators, and similar roles. These individuals are technically skilled and responsible for building and maintaining automation processes, but they facilitate rather than build processes for all departments.
Early research: Competitive Analysis and Persona Development
We began with a thorough competitive analysis to understand the landscape of existing business process automation tools. We observed a spectrum of design choices, from highly technical tools to completely guided, user-friendly approaches. Our target persona, the IT Admin, is typically more technically inclined, but customer interviews revealed that our tool would also be used by less technical stakeholders.
Outcome: Get a better understanding of the competitive space
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Analyzed 7 different top competitors
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Determined 3 different styles of business process automation builders for different experience levels
Building on Vasion Automate Pro
We had a preexisting tool, Vasion Automate Pro, which heavily relied on business services to create meaningful processes for customers. To scale effectively, we needed to create a tool that was user-friendly for all users while powerful enough to meet the needs of small to enterprise-level customers. We opted for a hybrid approach: guiding users through process building while incorporating advanced features like conditional branching for more complex workflows.
Before: Vasion Automate Pro; older on premise technology.
Early Usability Testing
As we developed potential solutions, we engaged in iterative testing and refinement. We worked for months the update to a new design system using Google's Material Design 3 framkework. It took time to implement the new components from past customer requirements, make the design responsive from the beginning and to simplify the design. We conducted usability tests with various stakeholders, ensuring the design remained responsive and intuitive. Each iteration brought us closer to a balanced tool that combined simplicity with powerful functionality.
Design Update: This was the first major iteration to be tested and it wouldn't be the last before general availability.
Innovation and simplification in every component
We took a mobile first approach to keep mobile top-of-mind. One big example of this is the side sheet within the workflow designer. The side sheet in every case is its own page on mobile. If a user were to move from desktop to mobile or vice versa the experience would be very close to what they were experiencing previously.
Responsive by design (Material Design 3)
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We wanted to make step cards more intuitive by using less space and making the cards responsive by design. The larger step cards were taking up too much space. More space equaled more time to complete tasks because of additional scrolling. Context was quickly lost as users would have to scroll back and forth to remember what previous steps did.
Old, large, step card
New, mobile responsive card.
Testing told us that this is what users really needed to see.
All work was consolidated to the side sheet. This meant less moving around from the step cards to the side navigation. Also, by using the side sheet and thinking about mobile, the side sheet could also expand experiences with less space.
Side sheets act like a single mobile page experience.
Without having a large step card to edit each part of a step, the side sheet had to hand more in less space. This worked out well, again, thinking about the mobile responsive side of the design.
Side sheets allow more space for expanded content.
Wrapping up
Unfortunately, I was moved off the workflow team before the product was released to our customers. The feedback that we have received once released hasn't been so much about usability but more about the workflow tool needing to be more capable. Customers haven't used it as much as we would have hoped because it doesn't solve enough of their business process problems. This has been a setback.
The solution to missing the mark on the release is Strategic UX. Strategic UX aims to continuously deeply understand customers' needs. Learn more in my strategic UX case.
Credits
This project couldn’t exist without these wonderful people I collaborated with over the course of the project:
Maria Trujillo
Principal Product Manager @ Lendio
Ryan Corry
Backend Engineer @ Vasion
Justin Fife
Engineer Director @ Vasion
Russ Clegg
Sr. SDET@ Vasion
James Walsh
Sr. Software Engineer @ Tomo
Hunter Campbell
Sr. Software Engineer @ Vasion
Kimberly Johnson
Software Engineer @ Vasion
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