My Role & Process

• Stakeholder Interviews - Gaining understanding of bussiness needs and customer desires
• Competitor Analysis - Learn where FOREVER stands in the market. Learn the competitors' strengths, weaknesses, and strategies that create an advantage
• Low-fidelity Wireframes & Information Architecture
• Remote User Testing
• High Fidelity Mock Ups
• Moderated Usability Sessions
• Implementation - HTML, CSS, SaaS, SMACSS, Ruby on Rails

My process began with meeting with several business stakeholders and taking note of their needs and expectations around the product. This was followed by extensive competitor analysis during which I learned about industry standards and what some of the best practices for this sort of project could be. This also helped me ground some of my design decisions in reality and common practice.

Understanding that our offering was unique and not fully one-to-one with other competitors, I followed this step by creating low-fidelity wireframes that laid out my proposed hierarchy of information and calls-to-action. I utilized User Testing software to create a test script and have real users in our target audience test the prototype and give feedback I could react to. Additionally, I continued to socialize my findings and wireframes with stakeholders throughout the process.

Taking into account all the feedback, I elevated the wireframes to a higher fidelity and added new information provided by the business, and repeated the testing process.

Once the design was thoroughly vetted and socialized, it was time for implementation. I worked to code the final product into fruition using HTML and CSS through a Ruby on Rails application. This was a very valuable process for me as it was my first time working in a Ruby on Rails application. I became familiar with creating products in a database, writing rails methods and tests, and general rails syntax. It was certainly a challenge but I’m always grateful for opportunities to learn something new. As a result, it became much easier to work with Rails on future projects.

Takeaways

This was the first project I worked on when I joined FOREVER, and it was an incredible learning experience for me. I gained experience defining project scope by distilling information gleaned through stakeholder interviews. I refined my skills in writing meaningful test scripts for low fidelity mock ups that aim to test for effectiveness of information architecture and product desirability, and learned how to professionally moderate live usability sessions. Lastly, during the implementation phase, I got the chance to work with a Ruby on Rails application for the first time. I became familiar with creating products in a database, writing rails methods and tests, creating intelligent file structures, and general rails syntax.