The previous SLA for sharing data was one business day. Now analysts can deliver gigabytes in mere seconds.
In an ideal world, human centered design (HCD) and agile work together and complement each other to power the rapid delivery of truly useful products and features. While reality sometimes falls short of this ideal, A1M and our partner Excella created an excellent example of how it’s supposed to work with feature development on a product called Data Workbench. We were able to get a useful feature into users’ hands quickly by combining research, feedback, and agile development.
Data Workbench is a data platform used by analysts at a subdivision of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Many of these analysts work in a special department tasked with complex analysis tasks. They then need to deliver the output of their work to auditors, evaluators and investigators.
Data Workbench already had a way to deliver this data, but it involved filling out a form and waiting on engineers to perform back-end activities. In addition, the data was shared rather than transferred. If the analyst later deleted the table, the recipient would lose access to it. Confirmation and communication around the sharing was also a challenge. There had to be a better way.
Like many problems, there were multiple technical solutions possible. Determining which is best would require engaging with the key users, such as the analysts. A1M and Excella knew the right amount of research at the right time could speed up development efforts.
We began a series of interviews with key stakeholders among the analysts. We asked about:
With that information gathered, the developers went to work building a delivery feature based on a user-defined function. The analysts would call the function, a copy of the table they specified would be delivered to the user, and the sender as well as a small leadership group would receive notifications.
From the first interview to delivery of the feature, the process took four months. Given the highly regulated environment and lean team, this was impressive speed.
Not all the project stakeholders had experience with user research and the value it brings. Those stakeholders were pleased to see that pausing to communicate first actually accelerated the implementation.
Research enabled that acceleration by helping us understand our users and scope a minimum viable product that was extremely useful.
We knew the analysts wanted to initiate the transfer. But Data Workbench is a system of complex, interlinked parts, without a single UI, so creating a single button wasn’t an option. Because the developers knew that the users were sophisticated analysts, they knew those users would be comfortable calling a function.
The analysts told us they needed a way to confirm delivery. Email would have been nice, but that would have extended the timeline and relied on outside development teams, leading to uncertainty. Since we knew that confirmation was key, the developers quickly devised a way to drop a text file into the sender’s folder.
These are just two examples from the project showing how human centered design principles focused on the users helped empower developers. Instead of the project slowing down due to extensive research, the developers focused on building the right components and avoided unnecessary features.
The insights and findings of a research project aren’t the only benefits. Research can also help establish valuable trust with users. This trust allowed developers to receive helpful feedback during development and testing, making the feature even more useful before release.
By engaging with users directly, and integrating HCD and agile development practices, we achieved great results.
We embrace complex problems with a respect for the past and a vision for the future.
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A1M team members come from a broad variety of backgrounds and expertises. We love to share our knowledge with others.
