Nov 11, 2024
Nov 11, 2024
Nov 11, 2024
Building Out a Digital Whiteboard Solution (tvOS)
Building Out a Digital Whiteboard Solution (tvOS)
Building Out a Digital Whiteboard Solution (tvOS)
The Current State
I worked with a fellow design contractor based out of Toronto on a special project to reimagine the current setup of how local funeral homes were experiencing both documenting funeral and cemetery services and collaborating as a team. We visited with a number of different locations, in Houston and the Toronto area, and talked to location managers, funeral directors, and cemetery personnel to better understand how the whiteboard affected what they do on a day to day basis (teams huddling around a whiteboard in the morning discussing upcoming events was a common thread). There were a wide variety of solutions, from physical whiteboards with a ton of rows outfitted for a weekly schedule, to different instances of Google Sheets that varied per location. They were personal solutions and to them, they worked...but could the experience be improved upon from a technology standpoint?
OUR MISSION
To elevate the current huddle and whiteboard experience.
OUR PROCESS
Create a SurveyMonkey survey to go out to participating locations that would help define areas of improvement with the current whiteboard experience and also help encourage the locations to think of ways where the current experience could be better.
Understand the benefits of a digital whiteboard platform and identify early on any obstacles that would impede the vision from being broadly executed.
Outline a working process/model that would encourage adoption by locations and explain the ways it would make their lives easier and make the work they were doing more efficient.
Create a POC framework using tvOS as the container for housing the solution across different locations.
What we learned from the surveys
The vision is 'extremely desirable'
Ability to view funeral case-related information on a large TV and have it be updated automatically
Ability to view on a laptop or computer at the funeral home
Ability to view on-site or off-site with a phone
Ability to update whiteboard information from a computer or phone
No duplicate entry of information
POTENTIAL UPSIDES
Increased Service Excellence
Increased security and trust in PPI
Increased team accountability
Clarity into which staff is covering what task
Standardized and reduced data re-entry
A micro or macro view of all the boards within our organization
CHALLENGES TO OVERCOME
Willingness for the field to adopt and change
A dependable offline mode if there's a loss of power
Personal mobile devices vs. company devices
Technology knowledge across the field
Physicality of using the whiteboard
Non-standardization of all locations working separately
Guiding Principles
Using the voice of the end users (in this case, concentrating on our internal users rather than one of our traditional external consumers) we constructed these three principles to help create a Digital Whiteboard that instills a firm foundation of effective user experience.
Easy - It should be easy to see the service and decedent information all at once, no scrolling needed.
Customizable - Each funeral home and cemetery is unique and should have proper customization of the board to fit their workflow for improved adoption rates of internal audiences.
Accessible - The digital whiteboard should be accessible to everyone with everything—technology selection is vital.
Interaction Models
Interaction Models
Build (edit and configure) - Initial onboarding stage that allows a location to set up the type of display, workflows for that particular location, and view and edit for different user/role groups.
View - Main use case for digesting information across different user personas. Ability to view active cases, adjacent family details, relevant current and upcoming services in various calendaring views, annotated notes, etc.
View and Edit - Across different connected devices, I can access and edit the boards remotely, leave notes and comments for my colleagues, mark a row or column for attention, and even send to a printer at the location.
User Personas
To best understand how the field would potentially interact with the Digital Whiteboard, the main personas defined by business roles were documented for each type of location (funeral home, cemetery, or combo location) along with day-to-day responsibilities (below are 3 out of the 6 personas developed and validated for this project).
Form Factor & Interactions
Within a funeral home, the main form of consumption and interaction for Digital Whiteboard would take place on a large format TV (42-65 inches) mounted on a wall in a meeting room or hallway, and inputs for navigation and simple commands would be made via an Apple Remote or through voice dictation. There was a large amount of inspiration taken from streaming platform metaphors for having immersive views that were not overwhelmingly dense.
The main challenge in translating the "analog" whiteboards into digital was to be able to improve on the density of information while still allowing each location to feel like their digital board was still their own.
POC Use Cases
Funeral Services
The comprehensive view of all daily funeral services and appointments, appropriate for all funeral home staff to utilize by being able to see all high-level information at a glance.
Dashboard View
Modular layout showing how each location can configure a family of different components to suit their needs on a daily basis.
Cemetery Services
Primarily used to show upcoming cemetery services for both the cemetery grounds crew and funeral home staff.
Loved One Details
This view features a service summary for a loved one along with any packages/services made available by the family.
Staff Resourcing
A full weekly view of a location's personnel resources for both full-time and part-time associates.
Service Excellence Tracking
At a glance, view a location's program health as it relates to measurable KPIs and Net Promoter Scores (NPS), in addition to tracking post-service family followups.
SocialChorus Integration
Digital Whiteboard would provide a deployable platform for workforce communications to be displayed broadly for all locations. Earnings, town halls, and other corporate events can be viewed live across our over 1,900 locations.
What's Next?
Digital Whiteboard is currently undergoing a 20 location pilot program with the interfaces deployed to Apple TV 4K devices in each one. Our teams are monitoring incoming feedback and adjusting as necessary to meet the needs of the field. I was very excited to be able to help support our field associates in being able to work more efficiently and ultimately spend more time with our families.
The Current State
I worked with a fellow design contractor based out of Toronto on a special project to reimagine the current setup of how local funeral homes were experiencing both documenting funeral and cemetery services and collaborating as a team. We visited with a number of different locations, in Houston and the Toronto area, and talked to location managers, funeral directors, and cemetery personnel to better understand how the whiteboard affected what they do on a day to day basis (teams huddling around a whiteboard in the morning discussing upcoming events was a common thread). There were a wide variety of solutions, from physical whiteboards with a ton of rows outfitted for a weekly schedule, to different instances of Google Sheets that varied per location. They were personal solutions and to them, they worked...but could the experience be improved upon from a technology standpoint?
OUR MISSION
To elevate the current huddle and whiteboard experience.
OUR PROCESS
Create a SurveyMonkey survey to go out to participating locations that would help define areas of improvement with the current whiteboard experience and also help encourage the locations to think of ways where the current experience could be better.
Understand the benefits of a digital whiteboard platform and identify early on any obstacles that would impede the vision from being broadly executed.
Outline a working process/model that would encourage adoption by locations and explain the ways it would make their lives easier and make the work they were doing more efficient.
Create a POC framework using tvOS as the container for housing the solution across different locations.
What we learned from the surveys
The vision is 'extremely desirable'
Ability to view funeral case-related information on a large TV and have it be updated automatically
Ability to view on a laptop or computer at the funeral home
Ability to view on-site or off-site with a phone
Ability to update whiteboard information from a computer or phone
No duplicate entry of information
POTENTIAL UPSIDES
Increased Service Excellence
Increased security and trust in PPI
Increased team accountability
Clarity into which staff is covering what task
Standardized and reduced data re-entry
A micro or macro view of all the boards within our organization
CHALLENGES TO OVERCOME
Willingness for the field to adopt and change
A dependable offline mode if there's a loss of power
Personal mobile devices vs. company devices
Technology knowledge across the field
Physicality of using the whiteboard
Non-standardization of all locations working separately
Guiding Principles
Using the voice of the end users (in this case, concentrating on our internal users rather than one of our traditional external consumers) we constructed these three principles to help create a Digital Whiteboard that instills a firm foundation of effective user experience.
Easy - It should be easy to see the service and decedent information all at once, no scrolling needed.
Customizable - Each funeral home and cemetery is unique and should have proper customization of the board to fit their workflow for improved adoption rates of internal audiences.
Accessible - The digital whiteboard should be accessible to everyone with everything—technology selection is vital.
Interaction Models
Interaction Models
Build (edit and configure) - Initial onboarding stage that allows a location to set up the type of display, workflows for that particular location, and view and edit for different user/role groups.
View - Main use case for digesting information across different user personas. Ability to view active cases, adjacent family details, relevant current and upcoming services in various calendaring views, annotated notes, etc.
View and Edit - Across different connected devices, I can access and edit the boards remotely, leave notes and comments for my colleagues, mark a row or column for attention, and even send to a printer at the location.
User Personas
To best understand how the field would potentially interact with the Digital Whiteboard, the main personas defined by business roles were documented for each type of location (funeral home, cemetery, or combo location) along with day-to-day responsibilities (below are 3 out of the 6 personas developed and validated for this project).
Form Factor & Interactions
Within a funeral home, the main form of consumption and interaction for Digital Whiteboard would take place on a large format TV (42-65 inches) mounted on a wall in a meeting room or hallway, and inputs for navigation and simple commands would be made via an Apple Remote or through voice dictation. There was a large amount of inspiration taken from streaming platform metaphors for having immersive views that were not overwhelmingly dense.
The main challenge in translating the "analog" whiteboards into digital was to be able to improve on the density of information while still allowing each location to feel like their digital board was still their own.
POC Use Cases
Funeral Services
The comprehensive view of all daily funeral services and appointments, appropriate for all funeral home staff to utilize by being able to see all high-level information at a glance.
Dashboard View
Modular layout showing how each location can configure a family of different components to suit their needs on a daily basis.
Cemetery Services
Primarily used to show upcoming cemetery services for both the cemetery grounds crew and funeral home staff.
Loved One Details
This view features a service summary for a loved one along with any packages/services made available by the family.
Staff Resourcing
A full weekly view of a location's personnel resources for both full-time and part-time associates.
Service Excellence Tracking
At a glance, view a location's program health as it relates to measurable KPIs and Net Promoter Scores (NPS), in addition to tracking post-service family followups.
SocialChorus Integration
Digital Whiteboard would provide a deployable platform for workforce communications to be displayed broadly for all locations. Earnings, town halls, and other corporate events can be viewed live across our over 1,900 locations.
What's Next?
Digital Whiteboard is currently undergoing a 20 location pilot program with the interfaces deployed to Apple TV 4K devices in each one. Our teams are monitoring incoming feedback and adjusting as necessary to meet the needs of the field. I was very excited to be able to help support our field associates in being able to work more efficiently and ultimately spend more time with our families.
The Current State
I worked with a fellow design contractor based out of Toronto on a special project to reimagine the current setup of how local funeral homes were experiencing both documenting funeral and cemetery services and collaborating as a team. We visited with a number of different locations, in Houston and the Toronto area, and talked to location managers, funeral directors, and cemetery personnel to better understand how the whiteboard affected what they do on a day to day basis (teams huddling around a whiteboard in the morning discussing upcoming events was a common thread). There were a wide variety of solutions, from physical whiteboards with a ton of rows outfitted for a weekly schedule, to different instances of Google Sheets that varied per location. They were personal solutions and to them, they worked...but could the experience be improved upon from a technology standpoint?
OUR MISSION
To elevate the current huddle and whiteboard experience.
OUR PROCESS
Create a SurveyMonkey survey to go out to participating locations that would help define areas of improvement with the current whiteboard experience and also help encourage the locations to think of ways where the current experience could be better.
Understand the benefits of a digital whiteboard platform and identify early on any obstacles that would impede the vision from being broadly executed.
Outline a working process/model that would encourage adoption by locations and explain the ways it would make their lives easier and make the work they were doing more efficient.
Create a POC framework using tvOS as the container for housing the solution across different locations.
What we learned from the surveys
The vision is 'extremely desirable'
Ability to view funeral case-related information on a large TV and have it be updated automatically
Ability to view on a laptop or computer at the funeral home
Ability to view on-site or off-site with a phone
Ability to update whiteboard information from a computer or phone
No duplicate entry of information
POTENTIAL UPSIDES
Increased Service Excellence
Increased security and trust in PPI
Increased team accountability
Clarity into which staff is covering what task
Standardized and reduced data re-entry
A micro or macro view of all the boards within our organization
CHALLENGES TO OVERCOME
Willingness for the field to adopt and change
A dependable offline mode if there's a loss of power
Personal mobile devices vs. company devices
Technology knowledge across the field
Physicality of using the whiteboard
Non-standardization of all locations working separately
Guiding Principles
Using the voice of the end users (in this case, concentrating on our internal users rather than one of our traditional external consumers) we constructed these three principles to help create a Digital Whiteboard that instills a firm foundation of effective user experience.
Easy - It should be easy to see the service and decedent information all at once, no scrolling needed.
Customizable - Each funeral home and cemetery is unique and should have proper customization of the board to fit their workflow for improved adoption rates of internal audiences.
Accessible - The digital whiteboard should be accessible to everyone with everything—technology selection is vital.
Interaction Models
Interaction Models
Build (edit and configure) - Initial onboarding stage that allows a location to set up the type of display, workflows for that particular location, and view and edit for different user/role groups.
View - Main use case for digesting information across different user personas. Ability to view active cases, adjacent family details, relevant current and upcoming services in various calendaring views, annotated notes, etc.
View and Edit - Across different connected devices, I can access and edit the boards remotely, leave notes and comments for my colleagues, mark a row or column for attention, and even send to a printer at the location.
User Personas
To best understand how the field would potentially interact with the Digital Whiteboard, the main personas defined by business roles were documented for each type of location (funeral home, cemetery, or combo location) along with day-to-day responsibilities (below are 3 out of the 6 personas developed and validated for this project).
Form Factor & Interactions
Within a funeral home, the main form of consumption and interaction for Digital Whiteboard would take place on a large format TV (42-65 inches) mounted on a wall in a meeting room or hallway, and inputs for navigation and simple commands would be made via an Apple Remote or through voice dictation. There was a large amount of inspiration taken from streaming platform metaphors for having immersive views that were not overwhelmingly dense.
The main challenge in translating the "analog" whiteboards into digital was to be able to improve on the density of information while still allowing each location to feel like their digital board was still their own.
POC Use Cases
Funeral Services
The comprehensive view of all daily funeral services and appointments, appropriate for all funeral home staff to utilize by being able to see all high-level information at a glance.
Dashboard View
Modular layout showing how each location can configure a family of different components to suit their needs on a daily basis.
Cemetery Services
Primarily used to show upcoming cemetery services for both the cemetery grounds crew and funeral home staff.
Loved One Details
This view features a service summary for a loved one along with any packages/services made available by the family.
Staff Resourcing
A full weekly view of a location's personnel resources for both full-time and part-time associates.
Service Excellence Tracking
At a glance, view a location's program health as it relates to measurable KPIs and Net Promoter Scores (NPS), in addition to tracking post-service family followups.
SocialChorus Integration
Digital Whiteboard would provide a deployable platform for workforce communications to be displayed broadly for all locations. Earnings, town halls, and other corporate events can be viewed live across our over 1,900 locations.
What's Next?
Digital Whiteboard is currently undergoing a 20 location pilot program with the interfaces deployed to Apple TV 4K devices in each one. Our teams are monitoring incoming feedback and adjusting as necessary to meet the needs of the field. I was very excited to be able to help support our field associates in being able to work more efficiently and ultimately spend more time with our families.