We spend 1/3 of our day at work and apparently many people from various industries are suffering from well-being and mental health problems. Is there a way to “promote greater wellbeing when people are at work that will contribute to higher productivity and better overall mental health?”
Design brief: Design a vision and business case for a way to promote greater well-being when people are at work, wherever that work takes place, that will contribute to higher productivity and better overall mental health
We created an open and collaborative environment for solving problems within the organization.
Web Platform
Sprint Service
According to March 2014 Report on prevalence of mental health conditions in the workplace by PwC, transport operators were found to be 23% more likely to have well-being and mental health challenges than others. Also, transport operators have been consistently ranked at the top of industries with these challenges.
After initial research, our team chose public transit authority vehicle operators as our target audience and as we continued our research, we realized that the target audience was too broad. As a result, we scoped our audience down to GRT transit operators.
Brainstormed and analyzed different industries
Dot voting to choose a topic
Understanding different types under the transport industry
Brainstorming why public transit sector
Before conducting user research, we made lists of assumptions that we had and questions that we wanted to explore. Some of the examples of lists are:
Whiteboarding assumptions and questions
From those assumptions and questions, we did the How Might We exercise and a Card Sorting exercise to come up with our main research question.
How Might We exercise
Card Sorting exercise
42
Transit operator respondant
86%
are full-time workers
83%
of participants are between the ages of 41-50
36%
are willing to participate for further research
Survey results summary
Top responsibilities include: routine bus inspection, safe operation of vehicles, being on time, navigate routes and detours, and ticketing/fares
To start with, we planned out our routes, dates and times for the observations. We made lists of observations that we wanted to focus on. Apart from those ethnographic observations, I conducted further research and did 10 extra observations on different routes and different buses.
Planning for ethnographic observation
Map of bus routes
A driver’s cabin
Operator taking break at the terminal
After a week of ethnographic observation, our team shared each other’s observations and made questions for the user interviews. We were lucky that transit operators kindly showed us their lunch room and were able to talk in a group. Other interviews were conducted over the phone.
We interviewed
19 transit operators & 2 managers
Interview Notes
We identified pain points
& grouped them into 5 categories
Experience map showing pain points
Interaction
Communication
Mental health/well-being
Scheduling
Timing/detours
Possible solution ideation
Possible solutions for each of the following categories:
1. Interaction, 2. Communication, 3. Mental health/Well-being,
4. Scheduling, 5. Timing/detours
We had a few interviews that gave us some challenges to work with after our inital solution ideation. After conducting interviews with both drivers and management, we realized there was a bigger problem than what we originally assumed. All the pain points pointed towards an underlying problem of a poor relationship between GRT Transit Operators and their management . At this point in time we only had two months left, so we had to quickly turn around and iterate our solution for this new problem.
Diagram of operator/management relationship
Journey map
Service blueprint map
Through a process of brainstorming and wireframing a solution, we created an open and collaborative environment for solving problems within the organization.
We developed three components: a web platform to anonymously submit and vote for concerns, an ideation based sprint service for conflict resolution, and a follow up process that makes sure the solution is being implemented.
Web platform prototype workflow
Try it out here
The development of the web platform was not a required outcome, however we felt that it was an important component to create because:
We ran tests of our proof of concept with 11 people (3 admins, 8 students). In university there are similar communication issues, so we worked within that context for this testing session. We discovered our proof of concept was effective, and the admin from the university itself was also interested in implementing our concept for their own students and administration.
Photo of a sprint session
Outcome of the sprint session
Several functional tests of the web platform were conducted.
Sample text added in the submission form
Submission data recorded in our database
A service for crowdsourcing workplace issues by providing a platform to gather workplace issues and a tested Sprint process for rapidly developing solutions.
Slides of the RSA design proposal
Group photo of our inSource team :)
From left, Jessica Braun, Seul Lee (Me),
Seyitan Oke,
Jeff Towers &
Dhara Pitroda