Weyonje

Freelance Client Engagement (June 2020-November 2020)

A mobile app for quality sanitation in Uganda

Only 10% of residents in Kampala, Uganda’s bustling capital city, have access to sewer sanitation. Most people depend on non-sewer systems of varying standards and quality. This presents significant challenges in regards to public health and environmental pollution. Since 2017, Kampala has had numerous outbreaks of cholera.

Weyonje means 'clean yourself'. It was initially launched as a large-scale behavioral change campaign designed to support city-wide inclusive sanitation efforts in Kampala.

BACKGROUND

The Why

Statistics from Kampala Capital City Authority show that 64% of the city population use pit-latrines (more than half of which are unlined), 29% use septic tanks, and 1% engage in open defecation. Only 8% of the population are connected to the sewer system and have flush toilets.

In 2020 it was reported that the city, with a daytime population of about four million people, has only 16 public toilets. Due to the surging population and shortage of pit-latrines and other sanitary facilities in the area, residents have resorted to dumping human waste in drainage channels.

Part of the overall aim of the Weyonje campaign was to ensure timely control and transportation of human waste and garbage from the household level to the treatment plant.

Challenge Statement

The client was looking to create a GIS-enabled mobile application that would allow for licensed waste-emptying service providers in Kampala to manage and track job orders. Service providers need to be able to capture and track their job orders both from individual customers using the app and from the Kampala City Council Authority (KCCA) call center. The application needs to allow them to track customer details, job details, and financial earnings, thus creating a small profile for their reference purposes. The solution must also cater to the specific needs of the two demographics—the service provider and the customer—as well as be simple for users with little or no technical expertise.

• Device Compatibility - To ensure optimum experience, the application is set to a universal standard to grant access to users across all standard mobile platforms.
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• Intuitive Design - To provide a simple interface for users to complete tasks without confusion or significant comprehension gaps.

• Accessibility - To be inclusive of all users by supporting the needs of people with permanent or temporary disabilities (such as users with low or no vision).

• Usability - Ensure ease of use so that users can achieve their goals in an efficient and effective way with the use of the interactive interface to support low technical literacy and minimal clicks to action.

• Conversational Language - The language in the application is conversational and easy-to-understand, aligning with the voice and tone of the brand.

USERS

Personas

Based on the research results, I developed personas to address the needs in my design solution. They ended up serving as our true north throughout the entire product development process. Creating personas was a beneficial exercise for this particular project because it allowed the entire team to stay in alignment when it came to refining project requirements. We often referred back to the personas even in further-down development sprints when we were trying to decide on a particular flow, feature, or task at hand.

As an example, the persona developed around a potential customer named Theo proved advantageous in a variety of ways. This customer was passionate about educating others in her community on the importance and proper usage of the service. Her passion led to the addition of a referral feature within the app, allowing users to receive a discount when they refer another member of their community to use the service (whom also would receive a discount). This became a significant incentive for the community to utilize and promote the app.

IDEATION

User Flow

I worked with the business analysts, engagement managers, and developers to plan out the application’s information architecture by designing a site map for both the customer and service provider's point of view. Additionally, I accounted for the varying possible options for the services requested to organize the flows throughout the application.

Below is an example of one of the flows specifically for the garbage collection request flow for the customer.

Low-Fidelity

Due to the demands of this project, we were unfortunately not able to spend as much time in the low-fidelity phase. However, we did take time as a team to jot down some initial low-fidelity wireframes both on paper and in Balsamiq. This helped everyone on the team better understand the complexities of the scope in terms of the different users and flows that would need to be considered. These wireframes also resulted in different iterations of the user flows which helped us really hone in on what screens were needed.

We also used these low-fidelity designs to go back to many of the same users we worked with during the initial research phase to see how they would work through each flow. It was interesting to learn how many of the customers were not informed on what the different types of facilities meant just by reading the names of each one. One of our big takeaways from the low-fidelity wireframes was to add descriptions to each of the facility types. This made it easier for the users to identify and select the type at their home or business.

Inspiration

Before getting started in Figma, I took time to find inspiration on Dribbble for application designs that had similar features to the user requirements, since this was new territory for me. Thankfully mobile delivery-type service apps with step-by-step user flows are popular right now, so there was an abundance of inspiration!

Visual Design and Features

Once I felt we had tested out all usability mistakes, I started designing the final screens in Figma. I was required to follow the brand guidelines of the Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) as well as the Weyonje logo that had been designed for the larger campaign. It was determined that this would be an Android-only application (based on customer demographics), so there were no iOS considerations needed. On the customer side, it was clear from the user interviews and testing that the top consideration in designing the screens was ease-of-use. It needed to be as simple as possible, with minimal information on each screen, to make clear what is expected of the user for each step of the process.

ITERATION AND VALIDATION

Features

With this app, the main hope was to ensure that families and communities in need are served in an equitable way: that they are charged a fair price for vital services that can be accessed when needed and can be trusted to be safe.

After loops of feedback and weekly design critiques from key stakeholders, users, and the Engineering team, we learned that design treatments that are native Material Design would drive greater efficiency and create a more coherent experience for users.

We also worked closely with the Copy team to shape and polish the product experience. The Copy team played a significant role by crafting clear, friendly copy that helps users achieve a goal and understand the value of waste management.

We continued to collaborate with teams for feedback. Validating our design solutions through user testing especially helped us to become confident in our design decisions.

WHAT I LEARNED

Key Takeaways

This was my first freelance project working with an international client. When I was in Uganda for three weeks in early 2020, I spent a few days at the Google For Entrepreneurs Outbox Hub in Kampala. They invited me to share my knowledge around UX/UI Design and present a coding boot camp as they were looking to incorporate that into their curriculum. A happily-unexpected outcome of those few days was the invitation for me to join in on this project.

Working both virtually and transatlantically during a global pandemic was certainly a challenge, but we made the best of it. I wish I could have been on the ground during the discovery period to witness firsthand the user interviews and testing, but I was thankful to join some of those sessions virtually and for a great team who always kept me up-to-date.

This was a challenging project in terms of the cross-cultural aspect as well. I have spent a good bit of time in Uganda so my background in the country and culture isn’t too limited. However, there was definitely a learning curve in building an application for a process that I didn’t fully understand or relate to experientially. Ideally, being there in person would have made the entire project so much easier.

If I could go back, I would definitely spend more time on sketches and low-fidelity wireframes versus jumping straight into visual design. I now feel confident enough in my skills that I would trust my gut to design a better experience for the service providers and the customers.