Environmental Monitoring

The company and team

Caliber is a client-based technological company involved in developing technological innovation in the Pharmaceutical
Healthcare and Microbiology domain.

As the sole UX designer and researcher I conducted -

- Stakeholder Interviews
- User Persona
- Competitor Analysis
- Journey mapping

- Information Architecture
- Ideation & Sketching
- Wireframing & Prototyping
- User feedback

THE PROBLEM

Pharmaceutical manufacturers are facing huge losses...

Pharmaceuticals are investing a lot of time, money and, efforts in environmental monitoring (EM) to avoid contamination of the medicines and vaccines, posing potential health hazards to the global population.
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Recovering from a substandard production batch can incur billion-dollar losses to these companies.
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This is because, the current Environmental Monitoring
processes have certain pitfalls, which we need to solve:

THE SOLUTION

A tablet-based software that includes device synchronization, visualization, and automation to make environmental monitoring seamless.

Along with the project manager, 2 domain experts, and 7 developers I designed the structure (information architecture and user flows) and user experience (design systems and screens) of the EM software to help pharmaceutical employees efficiently track data with the help of device synchronization and data visualization avoiding any breakdowns and errors.

THE PROCESS

How did I design the final product?

Initially, I did not know much about Environmental Monitoring :(

Just like any other person outside the domain of pharmaceuticals - I also had endless questions like these.
I defined my design process, starting with answering these questions.

DOMAIN RESEARCH

Therefore, I first studied the domain of the problem

Reading literature and discussing the topic with the domain experts at Caliber helped me familiarize myself with the terminologies and the processes involved in the problem space.

Here is a very high level view of what Environmental Monitoring looks like:

Some key observations from the flow:

PHASE 1 - The Initial Attempt

We had limited access to the clients. We met them only bi-monthly. Hence, I defined my research and design process accordingly:

SUBJECT MATTER INTERVIEW

I started with understanding the user requirements

I conducted subject matter interviews to understand the “whys” behind the 3 major problems that were described to me initially. Additioally to undertand the users, painpoints and thier needs.

Key observations:

How might we help Environmental Monitoring (EM)
Employees & Analysts to perform efficient and error-free
EM monitoring and data processing?

EXEMPLAR ANALYSIS

Existing products addressed some of the pain points, but no one product did it all.

Keeping the recognized user needs in mind, I analyzed the technologies used in the space of environmental monitoring based on the following factors:

DEFINING DESIGN GOALS

Our findings inspired design goals for the system:

USER FLOW & IDEATION

Design goals into action:

A few rounds of discussions with the product manager and team heads regarding the features, requirements, technical capabilities, and constraints happened, which inspired the user flow.
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I did some quick paper prototyping to understand as well as communicate ideas of implementation to the team.

Wireframe sketches corresponding to each flow

A few rounds of discussions with the product manager and team heads regarding the features, requirements, technical capabilities, and constraints happened.
‍
I did some quick paper prototyping to understand as well as communicate ideas of implementation to the team.

INFORMATION ARCHITECTURE

Structuring the ideas for designs and databases

As, the development team had to start working on the system, I created the Information architecture of the EM system which would not only get the findings validated but also become a reference for the tech team to work on the database for the EM module.
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My engineering Background helped me to convey Information architecture in 2 ways - the design way and the engineering way.

TESTING & REVIEW

The designs failed to connect to the realtime environment...

I presented the mid fidelity screens to the users to gain their feedback on the flow and the system. These were their remarks:

" This is not how it works, we collect and store data differently "

" We think that the current solution does not make the job easy "

" How will it handle exceptions? We have some sudden changes at our labs happening now and then "

PHASE 2 - We decided to fill in the gaps with a second round of reseach

I went back to the sketches and comments to discover what went wrong... It was the lack of context!
With the requests for the field visit approved I flew to the manufacturing site to meet the EM managers and employees in the context.

CONTEXTUAL INQUIRY

Interacting with the EM employees in the context revealed some undiscovered insights

With this, I could map the painpoints over the user journey and realized the opportunities at every phase of the process during the contextual inquiry.

FINAL DESIGNS

Converting opportunities to design decisions -

DESIGN CONSIDERATIONS

With opportunities in hand - there were a few considerations as I started designing the screens:

OPPORTUNITY 1 + OPPORTUNITY 2

Making data definition & Schedule easy planning for analysts

The one time set up of data during the first time user flow did not work

Therefore, I created 2 diffrent categories in the main menu
- Routine flow
- Master flow: where users can define and edit the system data

OPPORTUNITY 3 + OPPORTUNITY 5

Establishing intergrity in information related to the process

The solutions comepletely missed recording crucial information about employee information.

Along with the raise alert feature for analyst employees communication, I also included a check-in/check-out feature to track the employee performing the tasks

OPPORTUNITY 4

Automation and report generation

The mid-fi did not include other devices that are compatible with the software

With the device functionalities described to us during the contextual inquiry, I could recognize possible device integration for major tasks and simultaneous data processing

These designs are approved - under development and have
already started is making an impact

Moments of learnings -

1. Speak the stakeholder’s language

I experienced a terminology mismatch between different clinets, where the same thing was called differently. This created confusion and also disagreements about the designs.

Event

Reading literature and Secondary research helped me catch the lingo. I used to study the clients and their product well before talking to them, which helped me familiarize with their terms.

After realizing this, I understood how important it is to communicate designs using terms that are familiar to the users.

Learning

What could be done?

2. Conducting correct research method at the right time, saves a lot of time

This project was done during the COVID lockdown period, due to which I could not go onsite for the research and implemented alternative research methods.

Event

However, later the gaps were only filled due to contextual inquiry. As it was the most suitable method.

What can be done?

Learning

While situations do arise where some crucial steps are not feasible, finding the best alternative and not stopping the project is beneficial for the business

Making Environmental monitoring seamless in pharma