Overview
There is a considerable large number of event management software on the market that can save you time and keep you organized. As companies grow, the need for finding software that is more specific and customizable for the teams attending and planning the events becomes greater.
Similarly, the MetaOptima C-suite and sales teams attend an array of healthcare-related events and conferences in different countries. The events can range from international conferences like the American Academy of Dermatology in the United States to workshops such as the Skin Cancer Symposium in Oxford and job fairs in Vancouver; therefore, the need for software becomes very specific depending on the type of events the team attends.
The company attends several healthcare conferences, trade shows, and symposiums throughout the year. Based on the type of event, the company attends as a speaker, sponsor, or exhibitor. If the team is attending as an exhibitor, there is a need to book and pay for a booth, prepare marketing collaterals, and work on logistics such as paying for power, furniture, airfares, accommodation, and so forth.
For a successful conference, there is a minimum of 3 people involved in the execution and management of such. Due to the number of people involved, preparing for an event is complicated and unorganized between everyone as they are all from different departments and there only execute certain tasks.
Finding a solution for this will help with workflow and time spent trying to make sure every step is completed without overlap or error as well as to find the information required in advance, which helps increase productivity and team communication.
We designed an event project management software to help fill the need for more seamless management and cooperation between all the teams and people directly involved in any part of the planning process. It is an all in one place to collaborate, share documents, track and assign tasks, as well as to communicate with each other.
As the UX designer and researcher on the team, I advocated for conducting and leading an affinity diagramming session among us as we both had experience managing and coordinating events and knew about the pain points before we jumped to solutions or features. With the help of my teammate Hernan, once we had the qualitative data, I sketched and created wireframes of possible solutions and created a user flow based on our audience.
During the project, I led all the research and design activities, created wireframes, mockups, and interactive prototypes. I created the mockups and prototypes in Adobe XD so we could have several small usability testing sessions internally before presenting. I then created and tweaked the final user interface for the presentation of our final design. We then presented our project for the first PDP event in front of the entire company.
This project was part of a one day hackathon style event so we knew we didn’t have as much time as we needed. Knowing we only had 6 hours for our project, we made a tight agenda as we knew certain steps were crucial for us to be able to come up with a presentable product. We decided to compromise on certain steps due to the time and user limitations. For example, we did not have time to conduct usability tests outside of the team nor iterate much as everyone was busy and there was no time to properly test. However, we would definitely include those in the future.
We knew since the start of the project that our product was aimed at anyone directly involved in any part of the event planning, organizing, and managing process as a result of our previous involvement. Due to our not so smooth experience, we were able to jot down certain common pain points for managing and organizing events. We then did market research and gathered more information that we used for our affinity diagram to determine the main obstacles and pain points.
Research
We first looked into the market to check whether existing products to help event coordinators manage and plan simultaneous events already exist and what kind of features they had or missed. In addition, we wanted to know what those competitors or alternatives had in common.
In summary, some of our findings were that:
We would have liked to conduct proper interviews, surveys, and observational studies but there was insufficient time and everyone was busy with their own projects that we were not able to interview them. As a result, we created an affinity diagram with pain points, processes, gaps, and every other information we knew in regards to planning, managing, and attending conferences and tradeshows.We thought this was a great way of getting qualitative data as the motivations came from our experience organizing these events together.
Once we gathered the data, we observed and grouped all the obstacles and problems into main sections that are currently lacking:
With our research findings, brainstorming session and affinity diagram we came up with possible opportunities for improvement but still considering the feasibility to create this project at this stage.
With that said, we thought of possible solutions for improvement for the overall workflow when it comes to planning and organizing events.
We started by brainstorming possible design features then we mapped out the user flow with functionalities based on user behaviour and needs. This helped us see if the different features and sections made sense and worked together as well as to see if any challenges came up along the way.
Design
I quickly sketched ideas of possible solutions based on the research stage as well as what we thought would be the crucial ones to have since this would be the main software the company would be using to continue planning several events a year. Also, we discussed the sketches and made sure we were both on the same page.
Once the basic sketches were ready, I started creating wireframes in Adobe XD to see if everything made sense and we were on the right path. Having sketches helped us discuss certain aspects of the app with our design opportunities in mind so we were able to tweak a few things to create a better user flow. All the digital aspects of the project were created using Adobe XD because this way I was able to create every step using the same software, which helped save time.
After a few edits on the wireframes, I started converting them into mid-fidelity mockups so we could do quick usability testing within the team to make sure the user flow were correct and the user experience was well thought out as everything was moving fairly quickly. Therefore, as I was finishing up some mockups, I would pass them to Hernan to check, test, and go through the flow/tasks while I continued creating the next mockups. Both of us would first test separately then together, and once we found sections that needed iterations with only our feedback, I would update and make changes to the mockups accordingly.
One of the major changes was to move the navbar from the top to the left as we wanted to add more tabs while also making it more accessible for navigating from one tab to another.
For my mockups, I used an already existing kit as a base to save time and created the missing assets that I needed that weren’t part of the previous kit.
Due to the time restriction, only approx. 4 hours were spent on mockups, usability testing, and the prototype so there was not much time left for big iterations. After a few quick rounds of testing, we updated the way some information was shown to improve the user experience as well as the way the platform allows collaboration on a single event. There were not many changes to be made as we were only able to test within the team so most of the edits were made during the wireframing stage. Ideally, in the future I would like to conduct usability tests with external groups of people to get a better understanding on the real needs and workflows.
We selected 2 screens that would better showcase the platform with the solutions and design opportunities we thought were the most useful ones - the main dashboard and an event view for our prototype and demo presentation. Currently, the project’s latest stage is at a basic prototype of just 2 screens that mainly showcases the mockups of some of the event project management platform’s screens. The main goal for this project was to showcase how teams would be able to collaborate, share documents, track and assign tasks, as well as to communicate with each other.
The CEO was very impressed with the visual outcome, especially for the short time we had to create the project, and the CRO expressed interest in knowing more and wanting us to develop the project in detail so he could bring the proposal to other C-suite members. Overall the project was well received by several of our colleagues, who thought this project would be a great addition to the company.
Latest Design
With the short time we had to work on this project, we couldn't do everything we wanted. There are a lot of things to explore and work on if we had more time.
We would love to do much more research and interviews to better understand our audience. I would like to get data from outside the team/company to know how other companies manage their events and what their pain points are to see if they overlap.
We came up with several solutions and features that were part of the plan, but due to the time constraint, I was not able to design nor fully flushed the remaining solutions into those mockups nor prototype. The next step will be to work on the other sections to make sure everything is accounted for.
We were able to quickly test among us but in order to create a solution that will be successful, we need to conduct a few usability testing sessions with other users. We would then be able to collect real qualitative data with user feedback that we can incorporate into our design to better solve users’ problems.
Once all the user experience and solutions are finalized, I would like to work on improving the UI design to make it not only more aesthetically pleasing but easier to use.
Future Steps
Looking back, I believe we did a great job on the project overall as we included research to base our ideas on insights rather than assumptions and achieved our goal even with the time restriction. Since we previously organized and planned all corporate events for the company so it was great to have real user data and experiences, as well as to work on something I can use to help my workflow. Ideally, I would like to spend more time to better flush the idea out, design, and implement the system.
Reflection
Our project scored an average of 8.7/10 based on all colleagues and C-suite executive’s votes.
Looks like you created a new company.
Great project idea. It’s going to help the team significantly.
Achievements & quotes