Teco
Project Type: Information Architecture
My Role: Product Designer
Tools: Figma
Skills: Wireframing
Aside from getting Teco into the hands of actual users before launching, the goal of our usability session was to highlight any major problems before we moved into the next phase of scaling student content.
Challenges
The major problem we uncovered through testing was that the information grouping did not cater to the primary needs of why the users logged into the application in the first place, and the findability of relevant tools were poor.
Outcome
I initiated an information remapping exercise and worked with the design team to propose a new architecture and navigation for the app.
Approach
Coming out of our usability testing with first time college students, 4 in 5 students were confused about how the homepage tasks were categorized, and 5 in 5 students guessed where the document repository tool lived in the menu based on process of elimination.
I worked towards understanding the problem by looking at our current categorization of tasks and information architecture. Not only was the architecture very flat and unscalable, there was a disconnect in how the different categories of tasks mapped to each menu item.
Original, intended architecture
Original navigation where all tools were hidden under services.
All the student content was housed in the homepage, which could cause performance and scalability issues in the future. We wanted to deprioritize the logout button as this should not be an action that students do often.
By focusing on what students expressed as trouble areas for a new or returning student, we were able to hone in on financial and academic needs. We also saw the categories of tasks as subsets of a larger tips or advice section.
Mobile First
When considering the new navigation and architecture, we had to take into account designing for mobile first. That meant we could only have a maximum of five items in the primary menu.
Output
Restructured the architecture and implemented a new navigation: Home, My Education, Financial Aid, Teco Tips, Profile
Recategorized tasks based on the content and deadlines of each item. Most of the informational tasks (articles, videos, and podcasts) would live in Teco Tips, a searchable database of helpful student content. This type of content would not have deadlines associated with them.