Internal Application / Workshop + Solution / Product Designer

Assisting a WORKSHOP to figure out Pain Points + Possible Solutions
for a Top US Energy company

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The Setup

 

Business

Transmission business squad at the energy company

 

Challenge

The challenge was to work hand in hand with our stakeholders to learn their current workflow, gain a list of pain points within the business squad, and evaluate those to decipher what the best MVP would be to start increases presence and experience for Transmission

My Role

Assist in creating visuals (mid-to-high fidelity) of a possible solution to the business units pain points

 

Project Time

Six months consisting of an incubator workshop and refinery phase to work on probable solution

 

Transmission Team

  • Portfolio Owner

    Dana Adams

  • Construction & Maintenance

    Christy Guenther

  • Asset Management

    Tab Jordan

  • Long Term Planning

    Cassandra Brooks

  • IT

    Delsi Love

  • Change Management

    Erika Sanchez

  • Designer

    Jorey Jones

Week 1 of Workshop : The Current State

  • Validate Presented Workflows

    Understand the backstory

  • Define Opportunities

    Align scope of opportunities and potential

  • Define 
Group Impact

    Define problem statement to ground ideation of future vision

  • Discovering
Validation

    Linking together users, problems, and opportunities to solve them

Workshop Exercises

  • Crazy 
Eight’s

    Rapid ideation of concepts that may inform a future state

  • Future State Workflow

    Reimagine the future state that reduces identified pains

  • Vision Board
 Poster

    Visual representation of our opportunity

  • Foundation

    Updated stakeholder map to identify the user

Opportunities

  • Work Prioritization

    Data aggregation and sharing

    Actionable data relevant to work


  • Data Collection

    Work prioritization

    Cognizant sub-station

    Leverage existing data used 
by other groups

  • Capital Asset

    Equipment tracking 


    Feeding work management systems with equipment change info.

Risks

  • Work Prioritization

    Bad data in / bad data out

    Weak in execution

    Not meeting rate expectations

  • Data Collection

    Impact is high

    Dependent on data collection

  • Capital Asset

    Bad data in / bad data out

    Compliance

Opportunity Statements

Design a way for C&M, MANAGEMENT, AND RELIABILITY PROGRAM MANAGEMENT
to STANDARDIZE DATA COLLECTION, UPDATE THE DATA, AND ELIMINATE MANUAL EQUIPMENT DATA ENTRY. So that all work can be PRIORITIZED, ALLOWING FOR CROSS-DEPARTMENT ALIGNMENT, VISIBILITY, AND COMMUNICATION OF PRIORITIZATION CRITERIA throughout the equipment lifecycle.


Design a way for SPONSORS to LEVERAGE ASSET DATA TO PREDICT LONG TERM ASSET STRATEGY AND SYSTEM PLANNING REQUIREMENTS to OPTIMIZE RESOURCE AND OUTGOING PLANNING TO EXECUTE HIGHEST PRIORITY WORK.

My Role up to this point

 

My role was to help understand the reasoning behind all exercises to come towards a sole problem to solve. We didnt want them to just create a solution in our first iteration (which was hard when you are working with stakeholders who are having the problems with their current workflow) but critically think how this could expand and effect the Transmission team. I created the Vision Board Poster sketches, which ended up being the focal point as I used this sketch as my description of what I felt the problem that we occuring.

Week 2 of Workshop : Prioritizing the MVP

  • Equipment Engineering

  • Reliability Engineer

  • Technicians & Support

Paper Prototyping & User Testing

  • Equipment Engineering

    “The application should recommend a starting point that I can validate”

  • Reliability Engineer

    *No RE’s available

  • Technicians & Support

    “I’ll only use it if it works. Nothing ever works right that you give me.”

 User Testing

We tested a few employees within Transmission to get their thoughts as to how they could improve their workflow and workflow. Like their stakeholder counterparts, they wanted a centralized place where they could, see all equipment and its assets, the condition and manuals on that asset, and the next best approach for that asset. Here are a few below:



Prioritization Finals

  • E.S.P.O Engineering & Maintenance

    Why:

    Desirable: High Adoption Estimate & Meets Needs

    Feasible: Integrate into existing initiatives

    Viable: Foundational for long term savings & risk planning

  • T.E.D.D Support & Technicians

    Why Not:

    Integrated into E.S.P.O

    Aligned to Existing Initiatives

    Fast Follow

  • Long Range Planning Reliability Engineers

    Why Not:

    Just Do It

    Aligned to Existing Initiatives

    Existing System Integration

Value Statement

Equipment Strategy Planning & Optimization Tool will empower Equipment Engineering, Maintenance Support Technicians, and Reliability Program Engineers to make data driven replacement and maintenance decisions with 100% confidence.

This will be achieved by consolidating data from disparate systems to drive a combined maintenance and replacement strategy.

After Workshop : Refinery Phase

  • Equipment Engineering

    What is the plan for this particular piece of equipment?

  • Reliability Engineer

    What is prioritized to be worked on?

  • Technicians & Support

    Should I replace or repair this piece of equipment?

Sitemapping MVP

Process

Final Handoff

The stakeholders and I were very pleased with the outcome of the ESPO tool. It served as a central hub where Transmission could have a list view of all assets and be able to drill down on it’s details; all on one application. The action to add comments and files could help the technical and field teams to interact with the app as well in a functional way. The workshop was so in depth and dynamic, it felt great to come to a point where the team was satisfied and couldn’t wait for an experience I help create, go into production. This tool should enable the completion of the highest priority work and facilitate the following outcomes:

  • 20% reduction in unplanned spend

  • Expedited regulatory recovery in unplanned disruptions

  • 25% reduction in maintenance work orders on end-of-life assets

  • Reduction in Customer Minute Interruptions (CMI)

  • Dynamic risk & cost plan

Conclusion

I really enjoyed being a creative and conceptual asset for this team. This was my first project in which I was a solo designer; enhancing my design and consulting skills in a multitude of ways. I was able to effectively listen and communicate to the stakeholders as we worked hand in hand for months. I was able to be fully immersed into the project, its full behaviors, and all its possibilities. For this project to be an “Exploration and Innovation” opportunity, it was a designer’s dream because there weren’t as many restriction; yet wanting to see how creative and user-centric we could be with our ideals.

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