Fleet is a mobile application for member-based organizations. Fleet reduces administrative overhead and enhances revenue-generating opportunities by combining all necessary management functions into a single mobile app used by both members and admins.

Fleet is developed by the Baltimore-based software entrepreneurship company MasT (an abbreviation of “Massive Transparency”). Fleet accounts typically are initiated by membership organizations. Fleet clients (membership organizations) can then invite their members to create accounts and use Fleet to maintain an organization calendar and groups. As a full CRM/ERP system, the primary goal is for the organization to collect better data about their membership so as to create and deliver more value toward the organization’s mission, and for member users to have greater control over their own data within the organization.

The application differentiate between administrator end users and member end users. Administrator users manage the organization’s calendar, groups, and marketplace and use the app to check members into events and sell merchandise. Member end users are empowered by Fleet to manage their membership status (i.e. check whether active, renew, etc.), view upcoming events and meetings and add to their calendar, view and contact organization groups or committees (where applicable), and make other purchases such as event tickets and organization swag. Fleet calls it, “the whole organization, in your pocket.”

The purpose of the present usability study is to assist the client (Fleet by MasT co-founder) and his team in achieving their vision of supporting membership organizations’ missions through better data collection and constituent management but investigating the needs of users and advocating for the users. The primary usability goals of our client are ease of navigation and carrying out fundamental tasks. Our assessment to this point addresses these goals and identifies additional needs and priorities voiced by user participants and discovered during our evaluation.

Ravi

Ravi is a 29-year-old single man working as an Engineer in a field of interest. He is energetic, adventurous and enthusiastic in learning new things. He thinks likes to try out the latest tech devices and understands the way mobile applications work. He is passionate about his career and was recently promoted. Ravi likes to watch movies and TV shows of different genres. He takes violin lessons and is interested in learning about art. In his spare time, he likes to cook good food and relax with friends. He plans to travel around the world and visit new places. He is originally from India and his family is an integral part of his life. He spends time planning events like birthdays and anniversaries for family and friends back in India to surpass the time difference and distance between them. Ravi has a routine he likes to follow on his working days and tends to enjoy his weekends by hanging out with friends/family. He tries to have some alone-time each weekend to catch up the things he’s reading. He wishes to take up volunteering opportunities with underprivileged kids when he has more time in the future. Being independent and spreading care and happiness is his priority.

Tina

Tina is a 35-year-old woman. She got married a couple years ago and does not have children. She is energetic and passionate about her career as an urban planner and was recently promoted to senior management. She wakes up early each morning to take her dog, Betty, for a walk in the park and to think about her goals for the day. Typically, Tina heads to the office earlier than her colleagues so that she can dip out for outside meetings when she needs to, which is frequently because she is affiliated with a number of causes and projects. She is often asked to take on leadership positions, which she considers carefully, as she guards her time well. Tina has volunteered with a community group dedicated to maintaining her local park for several years now and currently serves on the Board of Directors. She attends a few other community meetings each month in order to stay current on her neighborhood and city and gives back using her professional skills whenever she can. It’s a lot of work, and even though she loves it, she has to be careful not to burn out. Sometimes she wishes there was a way to make the smaller tasks easier so she could spend her time on high-impact projects. She is an active member of her professional organization. Her social life and professional/volunteer life overlap dramatically: after-work happy hours with friends double as planning meetings for the park or brainstorming sessions for a potential urban planning contract. Tina loves traveling, taking weekend trips around the US whenever she can sneak away. She spends whatever other free time she has--maybe an hour or so in the evenings--reading the latest bestselling fiction. Thankfully, her husband loves to cook, and she cherishes the time they get to spend together over dinner, even if it usually isn’t until 8 or 9 PM!

Each participant was asked to attempt three tasks stemming from the PD session conducted and aligning with UARs. Participants were assured that their experience did not reflect on them, but on the functionality of the app. They were also assured that the design was iterative and collaborative, and that they should feel free to criticize any aspect and suggest improvements. Each participant was given an example of how think-aloud works, and was provided a list of the tasks in writing.

The tasks included:

• Sign into Fleet app using an organization code
• Find out whether you are a member of any groups
• Add a specified item to your cart

I made an effort to keep the “look and feel” of our redesign consistent between versions. This way, when I test the designs on users, I will find out how functional differences--which are at the root of the research questions--impact usability and experience. I used Google’s Material Design design language to create a simple look and feel similar to that of the current app.

Version A

Version B

• Learned UI design patterns by following Material design guidelines
• Learned new collaborative design tool Figma for high fidelity prototyping
• Learned new research techniques to help identify user needs
• Every stakeholder brings something new to the table