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Paper

From chaos to clarity

How 50,000 employees benefit from an improved information architecture

Reading time: approx. 5′ 00″

Acceptance Pattern & Adoption Rate
Employee Productiveness
Industry Interfaces
Information Architecture
Rollout-Strategy & Digital Roadmap
Service Design
User Research & Need Analysis

Volkswagen PartnerNet and ServiceNet serve as central information systems for around 50,000 users in around 2,400 car dealerships in Germany. These systems, which comprise more than 70,000 documents and articles, serve various areas such as sales, scheduling, marketing, service, workshop and parts service. The information requirements vary greatly and range from general information retrieval to specific, context-specific information retrieval.

User requirements and system revision

At the start of the project, the detailed user requirements were largely unknown. The existing systems had been continuously developed over the years and adapted to current information requirements. Nevertheless, in many cases, the structures that had evolved over the years, which were strongly based on an internal perspective, no longer reflected daily user requirements. In addition, the strong separation of the sales (PartnerNet) and service (ServiceNet) areas did not correspond to the actual organisational structure in the car dealerships. It was therefore necessary to merge the systems, restructure the content and develop alternative access structures.

User-centred development approach

Due to the uncertainty about the current usage contexts and information requirements of the user groups in the car dealership, a user-centred development approach was required. The role of the user experience team, information architects and user interface designers was multifaceted in the development process. Important milestones and challenges in the project included the evaluation of user needs in everyday working life through the active integration of users, the design of a user-centred information architecture for around 70,000 individual documents and 15 user groups in the dealership as well as the management and communication of the development process between the departments involved, Group IT and external programming service providers.

The development approach was divided into three main axes: draft and design, expert and user interaction as well as concept, definition and optimisation. Draft and design worked in constant interaction with expert and user interaction in order to achieve the appropriate method and output for the evaluation and optimisation of user interactions. This enabled flexible and practice-orientated user integration. The results from these areas were combined in the concept and definition phase in order to develop a consistent and logical information architecture.

Persona design and user stories

To begin with, persona design and the creation of user stories were carried out in order to lay the foundation for the user-centred design approach. This included a reduction to the design-relevant archetypes from the various areas of the dealership. The archetypes were used to map the daily use cases in everyday work through user stories, which helped to cover 80% of the structural and functional requirements for the overall system.

Goal

The aim of the user interaction was to define the needs and requirements structures for the future Volkswagen InfoNet from the perspective of the users in the various car dealership areas and to review and optimise the design from the user's point of view as the project progressed. Methods such as the Expert UX Check, integrative design workshops, qualitative focus groups, context interviews and user tests were used to collect relevant design indicators, identify optimisation potential and create a positive basic acceptance for the new system.

Design process and prototyping

The quick (hand) scribble of the planned design provided a good entry point into the design process and enabled the early integration of the various specialist departments involved. The digitalisation of the designs through wireframe design created a flexible and easily scalable basis for the efficient duplication of different screen views. The conversion of the wireframes into user interface screens focussed on skinning, i.e. the interface design. Clear standards were systematically defined in order to achieve a uniform and recognisable overall image despite the large number of individual elements. Rapid prototyping, click dummies and simulations of the real system aimed to make the design, information architecture and interaction structures tangible and to test them.

Adaptation and optimisation process

The concept, design and definition process combined the results from the user interactions and the design steps. Parallel to this, a continuous adaptation and optimisation process of the information architecture and the user interface was initiated and run through in line with user requirements. The user interface elements were standardised and the necessary design and interaction specifications were defined in detail for the programming implementation. The aim was to create standardised UI elements with a high degree of flexibility and scalability for the implementation and subsequent further development of the system.

Basic design approaches

Basic design approaches of the developed system included an information architecture that follows the principle ‘analogue is digital’. The main areas of the navigation structure are based on the typical organisational structure in a car dealership in order to support simple and intuitive orientation. The integration of personalised, function-related areas, alternative access systems for context- and task-specific user requirements and an individual toolbar with quick access and tools were further key features of the system. These approaches were aimed at improving efficiency and the targeted presentation of information for users.

Role of information architects and UI designers

Information architects and user interface designers can play a central role in the realisation of large-scale UI projects at group level and positively drive the interdisciplinary development process between the stakeholders involved. The visual and simulation-based communication of the designs, interfaces and interaction structures created a common basis for communication, which was necessary for a common understanding on the technical and functional side. This represents a new challenge and opportunity for user experience teams.

Published in

Usability Professionals 2012

Year

2012

Authors

Oliver Gerstheimer, Sebastian Ammermüller, Gesa Nolte

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