Barclays
Proof of concept prototype
Rolls-Royce Motor Cars has given me the incredible opportunity to work on a project from sprint 1 to launch. My team was tasked with redesigning the .com with a brand new responsive look and feel in time for the release of the next model, Dawn.
My goal was to drive engagement with the audience and generate leads by capturing prospective customer details.
I approached the challenge by immersing myself in the content available online and offline. From dealer manuals to brand books, I read it all. Eventually, I found all the nuggets we needed to build a story and capture the imagination of car fanatics and high net worth individuals alike. We needed to recreate the atmosphere of walking down the production line at Goodwood through the content on the website.
Barclays the bank provides colleagues in call centres and high street banks support to answer customer questions using an internal knowledge system. The purpose of this project was to prove whether the content on this system could be migrated onto a CMS platform which AKQA had already developed for Barclays. This system is designed to provide help and support for customers, not colleagues. It was my responsibility to create a proof of concept (poc) prototype to illustrate whether the system could be adapted for colleagues and if it would deliver a better service for customers.
To undertake this challenge, my first objective was to understand the content and functionality of the existing system from a colleague's point of view. Interviews with colleagues in the call centre, head office and branches were undertaken to understand how the system is used and the pain points. This research highlighted many areas for further investigation.
To identify the breadth and patterns in the content, I focussed on popular content used by colleagues. For example, the process to open an account for a customer. Patterns started to emerge in the content which I mapped out on spreadsheets and diagrams. Unlike the customer facing FAQ content which provided self-service support, the information for colleagues varied depending on whether a colleague was reading it in a call centre or at a branch and included sensitive information.
To showcase what I had learned, I planned out two user journeys to base the prototype on. I began sketching out my thinking for the prototype on paper. The two journeys involved a colleague searching for information on power of attorney and opening an account. The poc had to demonstrate how search results and answer formats should be adapted compared to customer facing answers. To convey this complexity, I developed an Axure prototype using the design patterns of the existing FAQ tool and copy from real colleague content.
The prototype successfully proved that the existing tool could provide a good user experience for colleagues. However, it brought to light the scale of work needed to migrate content. The highlight of the project for me was demonstrating the prototype in a Barclays branch. The staff provided great feedback which I could feed through into the design.