PORTFOLIO • Management
Aras Corp Cases
Discover how I solved challenges working in Aras Corp
as a Head of Design in the Development Center
as a Head of Design in the Development Center
Global goal
Improve product feeling and image on the competitors market
for a new version of Aras Innovator.
for a new version of Aras Innovator.
Challenges list
The first thing I had done – I gathered the information and got the needed insights about company and product challenges.
Based on figured-out information, I created the following list of challenges on the way to product improvements conduction through my Head of UX Design competencies and responsibility area.
A couple of solutions require me to work out of my responsibility area to deliver additional value for company process efficiency and achieve strategical goals collaboratively with other departments.
Based on figured-out information, I created the following list of challenges on the way to product improvements conduction through my Head of UX Design competencies and responsibility area.
A couple of solutions require me to work out of my responsibility area to deliver additional value for company process efficiency and achieve strategical goals collaboratively with other departments.
Challenge 1
Aras Innovator is a large and complex product, and the onboarding process for it takes about 3-6 months.
I have identified the risks of large losses to product efficiency when upgrading staff.
Solution:
In order to reduce the costs of the company when renewing people in the team and motivate employees to stay in the company longer, I conducted research among employees and implemented tools within the company that positively influenced the HR brand and retention of people in the team.
What was done:
Created a competency matrix for the design department.
Based on the competency matrix, a knowledge and career management system for designers has been developed and implemented.
Knowledge sharing practices have been introduced in the design department.
Solution:
In order to reduce the costs of the company when renewing people in the team and motivate employees to stay in the company longer, I conducted research among employees and implemented tools within the company that positively influenced the HR brand and retention of people in the team.
What was done:
Created a competency matrix for the design department.
Based on the competency matrix, a knowledge and career management system for designers has been developed and implemented.
Knowledge sharing practices have been introduced in the design department.
Challenge 2
Historically, Aras Innovator is a product made by engineers for engineers. I was given the task of bringing product design to a qualitatively new level.
I analyzed the development process from design to testing, and found points of growth in helping the QA department start working on new standards.
Solution:
Solution:
- Conducted a number of workshops for the design team and testers to optimize the UI testing processes.
- Developed and implemented the principle and workflow for UI testing with the involvement of UX specialists.
- Taking into account the possibility of scaling this practice to all other processes and interactions within the company, I initiated the implementation of automated testing for UI, participated in automated testing algorithms tuning.
Challenge 3
A long timing of searching for documentation on the developed features.
Due to the fact that the product was developed by a large number of distributed teams for quite a long time, I found a challenge in low speed of searching for documentation on the developed features.
A lot of time was spent on communication during the search process, and the synchronization of teams on the implemented solutions was really complicated.
I figured out the need for a unified documentation base. I came up with this idea to Leadership Team, and after approval implemented this practice in the design department.
Solution:
A unified design system was introduced with built universal principles for designing components and constructing elementary visual parts.
The principles of design-engineering are determined, excluding discrepancies.
Expertise on the components used has been created, which makes it possible to make decisions during the development of interfaces up to 10-12 times faster if there are analogs that were previously used.
A lot of time was spent on communication during the search process, and the synchronization of teams on the implemented solutions was really complicated.
I figured out the need for a unified documentation base. I came up with this idea to Leadership Team, and after approval implemented this practice in the design department.
Solution:
A unified design system was introduced with built universal principles for designing components and constructing elementary visual parts.
The principles of design-engineering are determined, excluding discrepancies.
Expertise on the components used has been created, which makes it possible to make decisions during the development of interfaces up to 10-12 times faster if there are analogs that were previously used.
Challenge 4
Product features are developed according to preliminary requirements from customers and going to release.
After release, we are getting the understand how well they are suitable for business and user goals. That reason makes impossible usage of efficient lean and data-driven approaches for the product team.
Solution:
I found out that access to the end-user is impossible due to the specifics of the partners' business. Requested and received consultants from user companies to collect product feedback and gain insights during the feature design phase.
Where possible, we introduced user research tools that allowed for a data-driven approach and accelerated task iteration without involving development teams during the approval phase. This approach reduced the company's costs at the stage of feature validation.
Solution:
I found out that access to the end-user is impossible due to the specifics of the partners' business. Requested and received consultants from user companies to collect product feedback and gain insights during the feature design phase.
Where possible, we introduced user research tools that allowed for a data-driven approach and accelerated task iteration without involving development teams during the approval phase. This approach reduced the company's costs at the stage of feature validation.
Challenge 5
Analyzing the structured interaction with a large number of teams, I found out the possibility to unify the approach to tasks formulation, and this way increase the productivity of processes throughout the company.
I presented the result of my research to Leadership Team and proposed a solution that was approved.
Solution:
After a collective study, was implemented regulation on the rules for setting tasks, rules for assigning, completing tasks, adding work files in convenient formats and in a form convenient for use has been defined and implemented.
As a result, the company was able to minimize the time spent on communication on tasks by about 60% in production teams.
Created allocation graph and advanced scale graph for work performed by the department. It shows all workload points, incoming request flows, the content of requests and response information, contact people of the development teams.
Bonus: maximum transparency allows you to quickly assign specialists to new teams in case of vacation or illness of those responsible.
Solution:
After a collective study, was implemented regulation on the rules for setting tasks, rules for assigning, completing tasks, adding work files in convenient formats and in a form convenient for use has been defined and implemented.
As a result, the company was able to minimize the time spent on communication on tasks by about 60% in production teams.
Created allocation graph and advanced scale graph for work performed by the department. It shows all workload points, incoming request flows, the content of requests and response information, contact people of the development teams.
Bonus: maximum transparency allows you to quickly assign specialists to new teams in case of vacation or illness of those responsible.
Extras
- Conducted workshops among the specialists of the design department and related departments on the principles of product development.
- Helped the product training center with the high-quality design of materials and product documentation by introducing additional practice in the design of educational documentation in the design department.
- Helped to set up effective work in a pressed time on the SAFe Portal project during their work on weekly sprints. This solved the problem of the shortest terms reduction, burnout of specialists, and reduced the workload on the project team.
- Studied possible knowledge storage systems and methods of effective knowledge delivery. Set the task of developing the structure of such a system with a reserve for its scaling, formulating strategic points and principles of work.
- I get involved in the discussion and implementation of solutions on methodologies and technologies that allow us to solve the problems of our company in order to minimize the time spent on finding solutions by other leaders.
Aras Innovator 12.0
Find out the result of my Product Design Team management practice in the creation of a new version of ARAS Innovator 12.0
Need an experienced expert in Design Management
to build, launch, scale or transform your
Product or Design team?
to build, launch, scale or transform your
Product or Design team?
Need an experienced expert in Design Management to build, launch, scale or transform your Product or Design team?
Andrei Tarasevich
© 2022 | Andrei Tarasevich
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