Projects & Goals:
The Office of Sponsored Research needed to replace paper-based processes and replace an old command-line system research administration system with a modern web application. Many long-delayed issues with the current system were addressed by designing an interface that guides users to follow best practices. The changes led to increased accuracy of records and clearer understanding of sponsor agreement terms and conditions. Calls to the Office of Sponsored Research have been reduced by 25% monthly, because the new system provides transparency to University researchers regarding activities and status of proposals and funding.
I also worked on a project to automate a request process for account setup in Oracle Financials, replacing 7 paper forms and 1 online system. The new system eliminates duplicate data entry and provides method to submit a single request transaction to setup multiple financial accounts.
My Role:
As sole designer, I conceived the interaction model for the system, creating consistent patterns for system activities. I created a style guide and UI Specification to be used in QA testing and to provide a foundation for future design.
While working for the Office of Sponsored Research, I amassed deep knowledge of research administration processes by interviewing people within the department as well as people who apply for and manage grants to conduct research. I applied my learnings to devise new flows and screen designs for complex activities and their multiple variations.
Work:
I collaborated closely with subject matter experts, business analysts, and people applying for and managing research grants to identify pain points and opportunities to improve processes. I diagrammed screen flow of major processes and identified which screens corresponded to steps in business processes.
Produced 50+ mockups of Research Administration screens and 25+ mockups of Financial Account setup screens. Conducted reviews with subject matter experts and representative end-users and iterated design based on their feedback.
Sponsored Research Administration system
The wireframe shown above shows how Contract and Grant Officers track the major terms and conditions of the agreement with a sponsor. In the past, people had to refer to printouts of the full agreement. Radio button and checkbox labels were renamed from the old system in order to clearly spell out terms.
For instance, a “non-applicable” choice was added to the Sponsor Licensing Rights, eliminating confusing situations in the old system, where the Officer had not selected either Exclusive or Non-exclusive. Now Officers are required to select an option, and there is no doubt regarding whether the Officer didn’t enter the information, or if the licensing rights weren’t applicable.
Financial Account Setup Process
The new Financial Account Setup request form uses data from the Research Administration system to identify the minimum number of financial accounts required when a sponsor grants a new award.
The two greatest pain points of the prior request system were:
- It was difficult to identify the relationship between an Award (bucket of money from a sponsor), the Project (the money to be applied to a specific research project), and Tasks (a portion of the Project that is accounted separately), due to complex business rules. (Multiple awards can fund one project, multiple tasks can belong to a project but may be funded by different awards so tasks must be associated with both the project and the award, etc.)
- Most people could not determine how to create a task associated to the project and an award, and then create another task and associate it to the same project but a different award.
To address these issues, the new system provides a visual representation of the relationship. Testing indicates that people now have no difficulty determining how to add tasks to the same project but different awards.
In the wireframe above, Officers can preview the standard notification before it is sent to the researcher. In the past, there was no way to view a Notice of Award unless it was officially approved and issued. The preview allows Officers to identify mistakes before issuing the Notice of Award.
Another improvement is the inclusion of the budget summary, which helps people understand differences in amounts such as funding to which a sponsor has actually committed, versus the amount that the sponsor first indicated would be granted.
The layout of the Notice of Award was modified to increase make the most important information prominent and to make all the information easier to read.