Access Rights Manager by SolarWinds

During my work at SolarWinds, I was asked to lead a design initiative of transforming the ARM product from Windows desktop application to a full-fledged HTML5 interface built using current Solarwind's own Nova Design Language.

My task was to research, understand and prioritize the existing features based on the direct feedback from users, data and product manager. I was also asked to create an information architecture, establish basic patterns for the application and start designing particular features based on the collected feedback.

First phase - Research

My redesign process started with the onboarding to the functionality of the application by the amazing team working on Access Rights Manager. I spent significant amount of time understanding the main use cases and flows presented in the desktop application. This was done through deep interviews, predefined scenarios and tinkering with the application on test environments.

First onboarding was followed by interviews and show-me sessions with real-world users which provided extensive look at the application in real use. ARM has a big benefit of great customer base that is highly engaged with the product and the team. It provides a good way of collecting valuable feedback.

To get some quantitative data about the priority of the features, I cooperated with the UX research team to create a survey of multiple questions to identify the most important features and main use cases as viewed by the users. We also ran a card sorting activity to better understand the dependencies and relationships between different features and sections of the desktop applications.

Collected knowledge allowed me to identify the most important use cases and user journeys for different personas of IT professionals ARM is intended for. Very important part of this process was validation of the data based on the pre-existing research, user inputs and business goals.

Result of the first phase was a prioritized set of features that could be combined into meaningful Minimum Viable Product (MVP) of a new web based ARM application.

Second phase - Architecture

Second phase of the redesign was all about creating a functional information architecture that is easy to navigate and leads users through their journeys to accomplish their goals.

Results of card sorting done through the first phase was a solid foundation for first sketches. Data available in ARM application are wide rather than deep and the applications supports multiple main use cases. We came up with a task-oriented architecture that separated the application into logical sections based on the main use cases. This allowed a fairly precise mapping of user journeys to the applications flows which tested as very positive due to the differences between the targeted personas. Very specific personas were able to access the information that was valuable to them without the unnecessary clutter that would be created by combining too many flows to minimal number of sections.

I presented and tested the architecture in form of flowchart. I talked to the specific internal users, stakeholders and a few selected users outside of the company and iterated based on their feedback. Results of this phase was a fairly clear idea about the structure of the new ARM web application.

Third phase - Ongoing design

I started the third phase by determining the most important section of the new application with the help of other stakeholders. Gathered data indicated that the most important feature of the application would be the ability to explore the access rights currently applied throughout the environment, provision new users and manage existing ones. So that became a first to be designed.

Design process started by reviewing the older notes from the first phase to create first hypothesis and sketches. First sketches were done during meetings and discussions, mostly on paper or whiteboards. These were iterated on right away in rapid succession which allowed us to get to the first proper design very quickly. Once I had a first solid hi-fi design approved by stakeholders I validated the designs with the help of the UX research team directly with users. Designs were in form of a clickable prototype and I iterated on the design process multiple times including the feedback from the users and presenting the changes to the stakeholders.

Results of this phase was a project ready for hand off to the developers. More features of the application were then designed in similar manner.

Design system

During the work on this project I was also deeply involved in documentation and propagation of SolarWinds design system called Nova. I was part of the team responsible for keeping the documentation up to date and for creation of new specifications of conponents.

Results of redesign

Currently, the redesign process is still ongoing for the new features and development takes a fairly long time. However, we were able to collect a positive feedback on the features that are already implemented in the new web-based application.

New approach to the ARM application provides users with faster workflows to make their daily work faster and easier. It also allows an easier management in the current home-office environment by not needing to install the desktop application but accessing the whole system through the web browser.

Takeaways

Leading the redesign process of the enterprise level desktop application was a great experience that challenged me to learn a lot of differences between the user experience in desktop based and web based applications. It also provided a lot of difficult challenges in redesigning features that are still available in old as well as new user interface. The critical need for consistency and persistence of existing configurations and data is a valuable lesson.

To really learn from an experience, one must also acknowledge what could be done better. In case of this redesign, the most problematic thing was the lack of quantitative data about the usage from the old application. The importance of the data to do informed decisions is enormous. Lack of this data meant longer discussions, more iterations and a few assumptions that could have been avoided. This also means that the new implementation needs to be observed and any problems addressed properly and swiftly to provide the best possible user experience.

This cooperation also confirmed for me that sometimes compromises must be made to accommodate goals of the user experience, business and technical possibilities.

Thank You Team!

Last but not least I would like to thank the amazing ARM team, my peers in UX department, helpful UX research team and all of the very supportive colleagues at SolarWinds for enjoyable, educational and fulfilling cooperation on this project.