Future of Work
- CO.Lab
Service Design | UX/UI Design | Product Design
Fostering effective communication in hybrid work settings with smart collaborative tools
Overview
The pandemic has accelerated the transition towards hybrid work settings where employees work both at the office and remotely. With greater work flexibility, hybrid communication over virtual and physical meetings presents a decline in social capital among colleagues.
Goal
Instill a sense of co-presence while fostering effective communication in hybrid work settings with smart collaborative tools.
Outcome
CO.Lab features a holistic approach: A visualisation of employees to connect within the digital office map, swift calls to facilitate quick communications between colleagues in busy settings, and an automatic active-noise cancelling device that reduces noise disruptions and promotes seamless collaborations between employees in hybrid work settings.
My Role
Service Designer
Methods
Affinity Mapping, Stakeholder Analysis, Journey Map, Experience Mapping, Personas, User Testing, HMWs, Desk research, Storyboarding, In-depth interviews, Prototyping, Ethnography research
Tools
Miro
Figma
Rhino Cad
Keyshot
Adobe Photoshop
Adobe Illustrator
Adobe Premier Pro
Collaborators
Johnson Controls
Year
2021
Co.Lab Concept Video
Research
Design Process
My team and I observed and gathered data from ethnographic research, surveys and analyze trends around the future work among office workers. We then discussed on how we can leverage technology into creating co-presence between colleagues in companies from identifying opportunities and pain points. To promote diversity in thinking, we worked in cross-functional teams; from designers to psychology and engineering fields.
Key Findings & Insights
1. Flexible Work Model - Employees opting to work hybrid more.
2. Productivity x Satisfaction - Employees experience higher levels of autonomy & work satisfaction from flexible work planning.
3. Loss of Work Life Balance - Blurring of work life boundaries with average meeting times & intensity of communication increased significantly.
4. Noise Distractions
- With trends of open office spaces encouraging open connectivity, noise distractions occurs frequently, disrupting collaborative discussions & difficulty to hear others.
5. Loss of Social Capital endangers innovation
- Hybrid work makes it difficult for those working from home to approach others while feeling disconnected. This shift to remote & isolated network would shrink people's networks with others.
“Networking as someone early in their career has gotten so much more daunting during remote work. Without hallway conversations, chance encounters, and small talk over coffee, it's hard to feel connected even to my immediate team, much less build meaningful connections across the company.”
- Hannah McConnaughey, Product Marketing Manager at Micros
With the insights derived from the affinity map, I decided to tackle the challenge of enhancing co-presence within the hybrid work experience and determine ways to increase the value of collaboration between colleagues and improve social capital.
Personas & User Journey
Two distinct personas were identified which reflect the underlying needs and insights, framing the problem statement and solutions.
Ideation
Drawing references to the personas' needs and user journeys, we ideated concepts that would alleviate the pain points. I facilitated several rounds of ideation with the team, building on ideas and afterwards converging to further develop concepts based on its viability, desirability and feasibility. The chosen concepts are integrated solutions that tackle the underlying needs and are aligned with Johnson Controls vision for the future of work.
Service Concepts
01
The semantic map visualise the relative availability of each employee based on the rooms they have entered with each room marked as different zones of availability. Avatars' movement on the map is seamlessly indicated by gantries in between physical offices. With this is mind, employees have it easier to connect with others through checking their availability.
02
Swift call aids fast connections between colleagues over confirmations or quick clarifications without further need for meetings or waiting on calls to see availability. I used storyboarding to explain the flow this concept in which the personas benefitted from this service.
03
A series of active noise cancelling systems that automatically lowers the surrounding background noises of open-spaced workplaces, reducing noisy disruptions, all while amplifying seamless conversations between hybrid work settings. This service concept mitigates noise distractions and improves communication and focus among employees.
User Testing
I developed low to high-fidelity prototypes to simulate the service experience and gathered data from user testing. After testing, one instance we found was the visualisation and overview is much more effective than just displaying names on the screen, which helps to instill a sense of realness and presence in the workspace. The feedback was well-received in solving their needs and areas of improvement were recommended at the end of this project for further development.
Key Learning
Complex problems requires diverse perspectives
Retail IDP - Driving User Adoption & Engagement
Facing ambiguity requires different domains of expertise that come together and build on ideas. My team and I collaborated with complementing skillsets that allowed us to condense research, data and speculations about what future workspaces will require. I facilitated ideation and lead the team under the design thinking process while I supported my teammates as they led the synthesizing of research, insights development and clarification of use cases for our solutions. This kept me to be open-minded to diverse perspectives and grow as a team, eventually deriving our core concept of co-presence.
Further development
Creating Communication Narratives - OptimAi
I would further iterate on the user interface and concepts with consistent visuals, integrating the three concepts into a coherent branding identity that can be communicated clearer rather than perceived as separate solutions. This would allow a clearer understanding of a complex yet holistic system of concepts that solves the users' needs.