Summary
ToolBelt is a labor solution for contractors, builders and tradespeople. The markeplace connects contactors, GC's and residential construction companies with reliable trade workers.
Contractors were confused with how to post projects and find labor on ToolBelt.
I took on the project to uncover contractors primary issues while using the app in order to fix project posting.
Role
Lead Product Designer
Client
ToolBelt
Date
2020
Before jumping into the design I created a research process for the project. I set out to gather qualitative and quantitative data from stakeholder interviews, user interviews, and user surverys. This helped us define design requirements that contributed to the success of the new design.
Six interviews were conducted with stakeholders for the project to bring all of our contextual knowlege and to the table.
Key Insights
• The industry has previously been word of mouth
• Early success through focusing on connecting people
• Lack of agreement for feature priority
• Quality projects attract better tradespeople
• Applicants are unwilling to pay for applications
I interviewed eight contractors and five tradespeople during the user interview phase. I categorized and summarized the feedback so our team could ealisy digest the key points.
I created survey campaigns to collect data and input from current users who were unavailable for longer calls. Through these calls and conversations I mapped a typical day for one of our contractors. I unified our team around these techniques to build trust in the process and get buy in for the design overhaul that was about to start.
The team recieved feedback from contractors asking to improve the workflow for posting projects to ToolBelt. Primary issues reported revolved around the speed of project posting, not knowing how many steps were involved, a lack of features, and incomplete applications being sent in.
We debated the decision to use a wizard or form for project data entry. The first iteration used wizards and the team felt strongly this was the appropriate approach. I contested that speed was the primary focus for the contractors, and that the multi page wizards made the required fields appear daunting.
An added benefit for forms was a unified project experience. We found that contractors were more comfortable editing projects, since contractors had already seen the form during project creation.
We expanded the trades and specialties functions to better support the mid to large size contractors. These users needed to staff large, complex projects that required multiple trades.
The expansion of this feature gave them the flexibility to hire crew members with multiple skills, then organize crews based on cost, ability, and experience for each project. A simplified UI for selecting and trades and specialties made this a seamliess addition to projects.
While many contractors were posting jobs to meet new tradespeople, some were using ToolBelt to send jobs to their existing network. We noticed this workaround and created the "Post Project For Connections Only" feature.
The feature gave ToolBelt a new dimention of no only hiring labor, but also managing existing crews. This also gave users a more concrete benefit to making connections on ToolBelt.
The improvements made to project posting impacted several features throughout the app and universal UI changes. These changes were made after carefully considering impacts to the overall system. ToolBelt was a very early stage startup and stakeholders were weary about changing what had brought early success. Onbaording, the home page, search and browse, were all eventually updated to provide better experience for our users.
The new itemized shopper display needed to represent the UNIQLO brand, match existing UX patterns, and follow HIG guidelines.
At the end of my time at ToolBelt I was put on an operational hold. This was a scary time for the startup and I eventually looked for new work. However a few weeks later ToolBelt received 2 million in funding from a fortune 500 staffing company. These designs, the work from our product team, and the determination of our CEO made that a reality.
I'm proud to have brought a user centered approach to ToolBelt that built trust in the design process. After these designs were implemented the team was able to share a common product design language, and was much more efficient at feature prioritization and execution.