a.g.
Work
Student
About
Company
Techmates Group
Client
Whirlpool Manufacturing
Role
Lead UX Designer, Consultant
Team
Lodestar Project
Duration
2 years
Location
Remote (USA — Las Vegas, New York City, Omaha)
Growing the UX Design practice with Whirlpool Manufacturing
Context and Goal
While working at Techmates Group (TMG), I was consulting for Whirlpool Manufacturing (WPM). The WPM team was actively undergoing a digital transformation to SAFe Agile Scrum. They build custom enterprise software for WPM plants. My role on the team was to support the Lodestar software development team by using UX research and design methods to build tools that are useful and easy to use.
Outcomes
In 2 years on the job
  • I educated the client on user experience design processes to support the team's goals.
  • I advocated for UX by showing the value of considering user needs to build successful products. I ensured time and budget for UX work was planned and implemented well.
  • I managed the UX work pipeline and collaborated with other designers. I onboarded each UX-er, managed the Jira Kanban Board, and took initiative to grow the roadmap of UX work.
  • I grew and maintained the client’s trust through timely delivery and provided support in their decision making.
  • I designed the MVP set of systems for 3 modules.
Part 1 : Onboarding
Part 2 : Materials Module
Part 3 : Quality Module
Part 4 : Backshop Production Module
Onboarding
To understand the opportunities I took to create value, I will introduce the environment of the job.
An icon of a factory
The Manufacturing Process
The users are experts in the manufacturing field. They are production operators, quality technicians, materials managers and more.
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The SAFe Agile process
The client is a traditional, large organisation undergoing Agile transformation.
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The Lodestar Team
The team builds custom B2B enterprise software, based largely on legacy systems and tribal knowledge.
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The UX Designer
I was the first UX Designer on this team, educating the client and advocacy for UX was part of the job.
A picture inside of a manufacturing plant showing boxes, crates and racks feeding an assembly line
Whirlpool Plant Shop Floor (02/23)
Plant Site Visit
Within the first 3 months on the job, I got to visit a plant site which provided so much value in having tangible contextual knowledge.
From the plant tour and meeting with people from Materials, Quality and Production roles, it gave me a grasp of how some manufacturing processes impact each other, though this was just the surface.
Materials Module
Duration
Q1 - Q4 2023
Scope
Design using the open sourced Angular Materials component library. Design the MBOM, Delivery Plan, Lineside Inventory, and Pick List for tablet screens. After deployment, design an additional Ticket Manager function to wrap up the requirements for an MVP.  
“I’m not sure what we would need UX for, I think we got it. We don’t need UX right now.”
— Product Owner
“I guess you would create the look and feel?”
— Product Manager
Materials Project Context
Design a solution for the Materials Module to manage movement of parts in the warehouse, parts delivery to the line, tugger driver routes, and line side inventory.
An icon of the symbol for code on a clipboard
The team I was on had a low agile maturity level; the PO was new to both Agile and software development.
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They had already begun development, creating Jira tickets based on the business requirement of a new Materials Module. There was no MVP defined and scoping was unclear.
An icon of a person
The team had no prior experience working with a UX-er so they did not understand the benefits of UX and how it could help bring clarity to the project.
A zoomed out image of a Figma canvas with many sections of iterations of wireframe designs and comments
Materials MVP Wireframes (02/23)
The first time the team had designs to reference before development work.
I was creating wireframes heavily reliant on the team to give me the context and requirements I needed. As many common B2B user flows are task oriented and repetitive, understanding the task flow was sufficient to produce the first iteration of a solution. Designing the details of the interactions and flows in the best interest of the users were done with trust in the team to give the right context instead of a data-driven approach.
The more questions I asked, the more complex the problem space seemed to get. We simply did not have the resources to dive into the context of each user or each plant. Visualising the business requirements and applying basic UX principles was key in showing the value of UX and building mutual trust.
“I’m not developing anything without the Figma’s.”
— Developers
Reflections
Diving into a real world context of a problem space with high complexity includes working within budgets, vague business requirements, tight time constraints, and limited contact with users.
The goal was to set up good working processes with the team and learn from the many mistakes we were bound to make. We built a base of Agile process knowledge; we reviewed how to estimate tickets, set up cadence meetings, write user stories, set expectations and more.
Results
  • I learned about materials management. I gained contextual understanding of supply chain and warehouse management, up to delivery of parts to the line.
  • I collaborated with developers, PMs and POs, and stakeholders to create documentation, user flows, and Figma wireframes to tangibly visualise the features and functions of the Materials MVP product.
  • I bridged the business-ask and the technical development by creating wireframes rapidly to build design runway. This put space between decision making and technical implementation to bring clarity to the project.
  • I included UX into the conversations of planning work to aid in story creation, sprint planning, and writing user stories that communicate user value.
A year down the road
The deployment of the Materials Module where design first got it’s hands in went well! This grew the credibility of the team for delivering the solution in the time planned. It showed the legitimacy of UX value, opening the door for other POs to ask for greater UX input on future work. Leveraging the planning support that UX provides, we were able to build longevity into decision making through the change management situation. This plan has aided communication within the internal team, and beginning a new relationship between users and the development team.
A screenshot of a text that says, "Hi guys! Updates for Materials has been going relatively well. We are now on Day 2 of testing with both shifts and the application is working as expected and operators are liking the product, especially how easy it is to use and navigate. We have gotten some suggestions for enhancements such as (blank), so overall the team is excited about the product. More to come as we finish out the week!!
— Product Owner
Quality Module
Duration
Q3 2023 - Q1 2024
Scope
Conduct basic contextual research. Design a Quality Master Data page, Configurations page to create and edit data sets, Quality Entry Points for line side data collection, and a Reporting screen. Hold user forums to gain feedback and build consistency of having developer feasibility checks.
Quality Project Context
Design a solution for the Quality Module to manage their master data, reporting, and data entry screens to track the quality of production on the assembly line.
An icon of an arrow rotating left
The team went through a yearly planning at the start of the year that did not account for design time for the new Quality Module. We had a base of contextual gathering and UI explorations, but not official designs or testing.
An icon of a person
When the MVP was discussed in detail and decisions were made with wider stakeholders, major design changes were accomplished within 3 weeks to hand off to the development team. At this point, we were seeing the time sensitive benefits of the team using shared language around the design system (Angular Materials Library).
An icon of the symbol for code on a clipboard
The Quality team comprised of developers that mostly transitioned from the Materials team. Additionally, we were working with a different PMPO who has many years in software and manufacturing, but unfamiliar to Agile.
Setting UX process
As the second time working with a PO that was new to Agile, and with a little more knowledge about manufacturing, I saw value in creating a Confluence document for the UX practice specialised for the Lodestar Team. It outlined the process from before design can begin to the developer hand overs. Creating efficiencies by defining procedure and implementing a common language with the team had immeasurable benefit.
Documentation includes:
  • Definition of Ready
  • Writing UX tickets
  • Figma File structure and navigation
  • Working Agreements
  • Approval processes
  • Definition of Done
  • Hand-off meetings
  • A formal QA process
A collage of some pages of a confluence document
Confluence Documentation
“This is going a lot smoother than we anticipated”
— Tech Lead
Results
  • I learned about how the quality of production on the assembly line is managed, the critical repercussions of quality inspections, it's effects on production metrics, and it's role in identifying lost or cost savings.
  • I put into practice a consistent and reliable working structure to help the development team know what to expect from design. Communication with the team greatly improved, there is a co-dependency and collaboration on a two-way street.
  • Over time, the expectation became clearer that design needs at least one sprint of lead time, if not more than one month of lead time to make meaningful decisions with users and management input.
  • Our Agile knowledge and practice improved in accuracy and consistency. Design's role in that began to diverge from being directly involved in story creation and estimation in the developers' velocity.
Backshop Production Module
Duration
Q1 - Q4 2024
Scope
Aquire contextual knowledge. Utilise Object Oriented UX methods (OOUX) for generative research. Design both LoFi and HiFi wireframes to test with users. Design the Production Backshop Configurations screens and Dashboard visualisations. Basic design consultation on Backshop Downtime Entry, and Looker Studio reports.
Backshop Production Project Context
Backshop needed a solution similar to the Assembly Production module (a pre-existing digital solution currently used in all Whirlpool plants), that allows users to manage their master data, log downtime data entry, and provide dashboards and reporting. The new MVP will be launched in 2 plants to replace the existing system and implement the easy-to-use and maintain solution.
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A Scrum Master facilitated our team's first set of pre-plan sessions and official PI Planning. This was the first time UX was involved at the program level with insight to the team's intake process, epic creation, prioritisation and planning.
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I advocated for UX work during PI planning. We managed to include UX enabler epics on the PI board before the development epics begins. This increased the lead times for design runway. We could ensure a greater quality of work with discovery and user involvement.
An icon of the symbol for code on a clipboard
The Production team had a change in management. A PO with high tribal knowledge, direct communication channels to users, and ownership over the deployment process had left the team. However, a new PO brought new relationships that was a great opportunity for UX to be involved with work on the production team.
Building user feedback into the product
The benefits we reaped from more than a year of advocating for UX and pushing for user involvement early on in the cycle was manifesting. On the design of the Backshop Production Configuration system, we were able to have user involvement:
  • We conducted contextual discovery through informal user interviews on their current solution.
  • Defined MVP features based on the discovery findings and design the wireframes.
  • Prototyped the designs and prepared a round of user testing to include user feedback on the designs before it was handed off to the dev team.
This was a first for many stakeholders on the Lodestar team to work with designers at this capacity of detail and granularity on technical and contextual decisions. As consultants we work to make it easier for the business to make decisions on what and when to spend efforts on. Additionally, demonstrating greater depth of UX processes helped to convince the team that there is value in investing time on discovery and relationship building with users.
A screenshot of Angelia conducting a user test with a blurred out screen of the design
Facilitating a user testing session
A zoomed out view of the screens and prototype created for testing
Prototype preparations
Results
  • I learned how Backshop Production differs from Assembly in it's processes having a greater capacity for automation. The manufacturing plants' processes range in complexity, from manual paper and pen management to an adequately digitised system, managed at their discretion.  
  • It was a big win to realistically incorporate user feedback into the designs. The design prototypes allowed for different levels of exposure to the plan for change in the system. It helped convince users and get their buy-in across multiple differing contexts.
  • The Agile development process does not always have the flexibility that working with UXers and users need. Being constrained into sprints and relative estimates does not lend itself well to discovery work and ambiguous requirements. However, UX can adapt to be the bridge that translates user feedback into structured plans.
  • The team has come a long way in establishing efficiencies and growing it's trust and synergy. The communication and collaboration has been greatly improved which shows in being able to reliably deliver work, and build towards the client's long-term goals.
Final Reflection
Materials 03.2022 - 02.2023
A gantt timeline including: minimal planning, development, revised planning, revised development, hopeful deployment.
Quality 05.2023 - 03.2024
A gantt timeline including: some planning, design with minimal user input, development, deployment.
Backshop Production 03.2024 - Present
A gantt timeline including: thoughtful planning, design with user input, planning check in, development with clarity, deployment.
Growth of the team
Having been on the team for two years, we have made huge efforts to progress both the Agile and UX maturity level of the team.
The timelines above are a conceptual view of the process to go from "hypothesis" to "ready for deployment". With each project, the steps we took and the time allocated to each supporting team showed benefits towards developing with greater clarity. We cannot accurately compare the difference per project because of the difference in time spans, complexity of the project and scope.
Materials had minimal planning a change of scope more than half way through the year; design was only considered reactively. Quality had some level of planning and design discovery involved, which has resulted in a more robust product that gives users greater control over their tasks. Backshop being the project with the greatest amount of planning and design time resulted in a user friendly product achieved more efficiently over time.
To note: This progress could not have been made without the support and feedback from the team. Each PM and PO had their own working style and attitudes towards Design and Development working quickly to deliver. My scrum team had placed great confidence in me, advocating beside the design team, for our selves to build something that was valuable and not just quick and scrappy.
Goals for the future
  • Make evaluative research a norm with new MVP designs.
  • Grow more relationships to influence the product before Epics are created. Allow room for generative research.
  • Refine the benchmarking process to ensure best quality of work is created. Build out a Design Standards guide as part of the design system to create efficiencies when working on UI.
  • Take a proactive approach to design work, aiming for one PI of lead time.
The Agile Scrum methodology was designed for Software Developers and the core scrum team. As a supporting structure from the UX Design perspective, it is important to note how different our working process and time lines can be. Of course depending on what stage in the product lifecycle we are designing for.
Agile does not have a baseline assumption that design or discovery is part of the process, and therefore, makes it difficult to include in planning. These steps are also often cut out when instead, they should be seen as deeply important to products (enterprise B2B) and industries (manufacturing) that solve complex problems.
This Medium article is a great read for those finding themselves in a similar situation as myself, navigating how design and UX practices can be heard on an Agile team.
If you would like to chat deeper about my experience (or yours!), please contact me through my LinkedIn or email, you can find my contact on my home page or resume.
Portfolio of Angelia Gan
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