ingage | sullivanwilcox

Project Overview

A mobile application where retirees can create and strengthen social relationships by finding engaging opportunties they are passionate about locally. Helping retirees stay engaged post retirement after no longer being in the work place.

Project Duration

Course

3.22.2020 - 5.28.2020

9 weeks

SCAD

Human Computer Interaction

Professor Sung Park

Team Members

Sara Williams

Satchel Hallmark

Peter Breissinger

My Role

Project Lead

Interaction Design

Interface Design

Final Deliverables

Prototype

Process Book

Poster

Rank A Certificate

Received a Rank A Certificate for being inside of the top 7% of 3769 entires for the Rookies 2020.

Draft Selection

Nominated as a top entrant for product design category and awarded a draft selection badge.

The Problem

Retirees struggle to maintain a strong social network after no longer being in the workplace, hindering them from finding people post retirement to do activities they are passionate about with.

Our Solution

A mobile application where retirees can create and strengthen social relationships by finding engaging opportunities they are passionate about locally.

Our Design Process

01. Secondary Research

Firstly, our group conducted secondary research to gain a general understanding of what problems retirees face and a better understanding of our users.

Competitive Analysis

AARP

Overall Retirement App

Interest group based

Provide news, benefits, and events targeted at retirees

Some of the UI visually could be improved, and the app is limited to AARP events and has little immediate community connection

POINT

Ohio Based Volunteer App

Best UX out of any community based volunteering app we found

Allows users to follow causes, find events, and meet people through the app

The UI is visual appealing and easy to use

Limited to Ohio residents only

02. User Interviews

Our group conducted 14 interviews of those in our target demographic of 60-75 years old. The insights we gained helped us understand what questions to ask in our online survey.

Our assumptions.

Retirees have a difficult time transitioning into being fully retired.

Traveling is a large part of retirees plans.

Retirees have an interest in volunteering after no longer working.

Where we were wrong.

Retirees didn't think the transition into retirement was difficult.

Retirees didn't travel as much as they thought they would.

Some retirees had a negative volunteering experience because they weren't given a meaningful role.

What we learned.

Retirees need to feel like they are involved and still matter in the world.

Retirees want to spend time doing things they are passionate about with others.

Retirees love getting involved with groups of other retirees.

03. Online Survey

Using the insights we gained from our interviews we created a survey geared at learning more about what retirees were most interested in retirement and where their biggest pain points were.

Some of the questions we asked were...

How do you plan on spending your time in retirement?
What has been the most enjoyable part about retirement?
How do you feel about transitioning from working full time into being retired?
What types of social activity do you engage in?
How has your social network changed after retirement?
When you retire/during retirement, which of the following are most interesting to you?
How did you find your volunteer opportunities?
If you have a part time job or consulting role, are you also interested in volunteering?

View our whole survey here.

04. Affinitization

After conducting secondary and primary research, we gathered qualitative data (ideas, opinions, and issues) and organized them into groups based on their natural relations.

Affinity Map Groups:

View our affinity map here.

What stood out to us the most?

Retirees want to meet people through the things they are passionate about.

Retirees enjoy having a flexible schedule and the freedom to do what they want to do.

There isn't a singular place for retirees to find volunteer opportunities that interest them.

05. How Might We

We analyzed all of our research results using the design thinking method of "How Might We" to define our design challenge.

06. User Persona

We created a user persona to help get a clearer picture of what our target user would look like and a journey map to understand where our users pain points were in their journey.

Meet Anne, 61 - Primary

Anne's Journey, Journey Map

07. Prototyping

We created an interactive mid-fidelity prototype and sought feedback from users within our target demographic before reaching our final concept.

Why jump to mid-fidelity?

Older demographic of 60+ doesn't have to focus on imagining interaction

More detailed insights on usability of UI for our older demographic

Completed interactive prototype in rapid time span (2 days).

Wireframing

Mid-Fi Prototype

Mid-Fi User Testing

What feedback did we get?

Initial High-Fi User Testing

08. High-Fi

After gaining feedback from our mid-fidelity and initial high-fi prototypes, we made the necessary changes and are proud to present our final result. Introducing ingage!

What did you learn from ingage?

Ingage was my first true experience with a design sprint ever, and it's hard to sum up everything I learned from it. The most important skill I learned from this sprint was how to work as a team. Being project leader taught me how to hold myself and my teammates to the same high standard when creating this project. I also learned to never settle with your first idea, and trust the research you're doing will lead you to the right place. Ingage taught me how to take my experiences and assumptions regarding a topic or problem, out of the equation. To listen to the people who were designing the experience for, and what their problems and needs are.

Ok, but what did you actually do?

My primary role was the interaction and interface design. I wireframmed and designed the interface completely myself. Being project lead, I wanted to be hands on with almost everything in the project to make sure we were making deadlines and going in the right direction as a team. I had a large role in the visual design, branding, and presentation of our project. I let Sara (our phenomenal research lead) lead our design research to make sure we were asking the right questions. She had way more experience than me, and I tired to learn as much as I could from her along the way.