We Do
Adobe XD
2 Months
Mobile Application
From attics to basements, and everything in between
“Every man should be master of anything he does and should do it in a masterly manner, with love, no matter what it is, whether hard physical work, menial or boring work, or inspirational work.”
No matter if one is a professional or a handyman, each and every occupation adds its own value to the society. That’s why people do looking for handymen/ workmen as same as the other. So here my job is to make a virtual platform for unspoken handymen which make their job more accessible to households and simpler.
Problem & Solution
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In everyday life many people get stuck at some situations where they need to find a skilled and abled handyman to provide a particular service for them.
On the other hand, a significant number of personal service providers/handymen are underemployed because they couldn't find an adequate number of customers to reap maximum benefits from their time.
Furthermore, there are a huge number of unskilled laborers and part time job seekers struggling to find a job which can be done by them like cleaning, gardening driving and more. So that I created this platform to solve the problem, so that users can easily link with each parties and utilize their resources more effectively.
Understand the User
I asked people who seeks for handymen physically to share their experiences and frustrations. I also asked them to share their thoughts on a way they expect to improve that task . To my surprise, people share very different stories on inefficiencies occurred in existing method of connecting with laborers. So, I incorporated the insights into the user persona.
Janaka Silva
Age: 38 years old
Occupation : Shop Owner
Location: Rikillagaskada
Hometown: Maharagama
Bio
Janaka is a leading businessperson in Maharagama and hope to initiate a new branch of his supermarket chain in Rikillagaskada. Since he is quite unfamiliar to the city, he was in a very difficult situation to find recognized, skilled laborers such as contractors, electricians, plumbers in the nearby area. Janaka is very keen on quality of work so as he believes 'Quality work saves thousands of rupees and hours of time.'
Goal
Janaka wants to have a reliable method to link up with recognized and verified handymen/ laborers for achieve his tasks with greater quality and lesser time period to initiate workings of his new supermarket immediately.
Frustration
Janaka is frustrated about not being able to get connected with well rated laborers. Even though he has found some contact numbers from word of mouth, he cannot rely on them since he has a negative feeling towards them. So, he hopes to look for a reliable virtual platform which links required laborers and handymen in a more trustworthy manner.
Janaka's User Journey
Paper first
​The following process indicates how my initial idea begins with its wireframes, then moves to mockups, and finally to the high-fidelity prototype. In this simplified version, you will be able to see how I approached in solving the user’s needs to find a laborer. There are preview areas where the user can directly see all types of laborers available in the app and laborers who are in nearby areas in a selected category. Also, there are some buttons to contact and review the laborers.
Paper to Digital
Some changes in the process
01. Better user experiance
Originally, contact, location, review buttons of a selected laborer were displayed at the bottom of the screen. Since it seems like not that much eye catching and it should be highlighted it has taken up of the screen. Now, those buttons are clearly visible to the users.
02. Better user interface designs
​Based on the user feedbacks, profile view and search boxes were replaced and modernized to improve the user experience furthermore.
Design system
Success story so far
I have received very positive feedbacks to the high-fidelity prototype from the usability study participants. Many of them have found that this app is really useful for them to link up with handymen and laborers in a more effective manner. Initially when I came up with this idea, with one of my colleagues I was able to present this idea in annual design-a-thon challenge of Department of IT, of Faculty of Management Studies and Commerce of University of Sri Jayewardenepura in 2020 and got selected to semi-finals. At that time I barely knew what UX and UI are. After I decided to study UX and UI more, I thought to use that idea and develop a case study using my knowledge on UX and UI.
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Upto now in this case study the user journey of the service consumer is completed and the user journey of the service provider will be added soon.
What I learned ?
When developing this project, my major concern was on Adobe XD as the major designing tool even though I am familiar with Figma too. As a vector-based experience designing tool it helped me to make my work much easier and improve my productivity. Throughout this project I have learnt how user expectations varies and how to address them in the most effective manner to improve User Experience. Further some important aspects to be very keen on regarding designing of UIs.
