Q&A PLATFORM
PRODUCT / 2022
UX / RESEARCH / CASE STUDY / PRODUCT / ENGAGEMENT / REMOTE WORK
AT A GLANCE
Our transition into a remote work setup has splintered our connections and moved us to private workspaces. Aiming to bridge the gap between what was and what should be, this idea was born. We felt a need, within our firm, to connect people providing knowledge with those seeking it.
Like the beginning of all great things, our hypothesis had to be validated. We used various research methods involving different professions, career levels, and locations to cover all grounds. The result clearly reciprocated in favour of a one-stop solution.
Our findings showed clear signs of apprehension about asking in an open forum and an inability to spot peers to reach out to for certain topics. It also highlighted the fact that the community was intrinsically motivated to help out, but the current methods of seeking and sharing were isolated. Often leading to a single person hoarded with pings, having to solve recurring queries. Laying the analysis in “HOW MIGHT WEs” brought a motion to our design process.
Charting out elements to maximise while aiming to minimise activities that might result in counter-productivity, laid the foundations for the features that we prioritized for MVP. They were then conceptualized and prototyped based on the Atomic Design structure to ensure maximum modularity and re-usability.
The project is currently focused on addressing dev constraints, early adoption and engagement strategies for the pilot study and first release.
WHAT WAS THE PROCESS
RESEARCH
To assess the pulse of our audience and get a high-level understanding of their preferences.
HOW MIGHT WE
REDUCE PEOPLE'S APPREHENSION
ABOUT SEEKING HELP
ON PUBLIC FORUMS
Contrary to the firm culture, new hires and some other folks were afraid of being judged for asking questions. Our solution needed to create a sense of belonging to evoke curiosity and comfort.
ENABLE PEOPLE TO IDENTIFY
WHO TO REACH OUT TO IN THE
CONTEXT OF THEIR PROBLEM
Participants unanimously, were unsure about who the right person was, to address their queries. At the same time, experienced/tenured participants were being hoarded with similar questions in multiple instances.
MAKE A PLATFORM THAT MOTIVATES PEOPLE TO HELP EACH OTHER
Finding the right activities to encourage productive support is acknowledged and rewarded.
CREATE A COHESIVE ECOSYSTEM
AMONG THE EXISTING PLATFORMS
Preventing non-conclusive discussions and unnecessary alerts since the nature of this solution was to exist passively. The priority was to keep it active without incorporating any dark patterns of engagement.
MAXIMISE - MINIMISE
MVP PRIORITIZATION
Everything cannot be done perfectly at once. Considering all the constraints and timelines in mind, ideas and features had to be filtered based on MoSCoW prioritization exercise.
TAKING THE ATOMIC APPROACH
FEED
Landing page for the user.
Sort amongst trending, unanswered and recently asked questions based on followed tags.
Advanced search features using prompts available when interacting with the search bar.
ASK QUESTIONS
Possible duplicates are filtered in real-time, based on keywords.
Cues are provided to help users put out a detailed query.
Include relevant tags for greater searchability.
For MVP - Minimizing clutter, streamlined with exhaustive buckets of tags to choose from within the platform.
POSTED QUESTION / VIEW YOUR POST
View a posted question, comment, answer, view open questions and other related questions.
Minimise non-conclusive responses - responding to a posted query was made slightly more difficult.
Commenting - Users have to press a button in order to view/reply to a comment which otherwise stays hidden.
Answering - A field to leave an answer was positioned at the bottom of all the answers to ensure users read other responses first and avoid repetitive information.
MY PROFILE
Manage notification preferences without dwelling too deep into the settings.
All things profile in a lightweight format with minimal customisation features.
BADGES / REWARDS
Get rewarded by the platform for productive activity, no BS.
Post MVP - event-based badges are to be added to cultivate a healthy presence.
NOW & THE FUTURE
The current stage of this project is focusing on tackling dev constraints, laying the foundation for a reward system, and strategizing our initial deployment model.
Once the MVP is deployed (Update: MVP was deployed and used pan-India across different studios to bridge a variety of communication), we want to focus on the following:
MENTIONS
Easha Gowri C
Research Synthesis
Wireframing
Siddhant Singh
Focus Groups
Design Components
Collective
Product Visioning
Prioritization