Achieve Australia — Website Redesign Project

Achieve Australia is an NDIS-registered for-purpose community organisation that delivers expert disability support services to people with disability in New South Wales Australia. The organisation aimed to revamp its website to ensure a contemporary and visually appealing design, enhance user experience, improve web accessibility, and gain a competitive advantage in the sector.

As a part of their website redesign and rebuild project, I joined the organisation as a UX Designer Intern in January 2021. Later on, in March, I joined the team as a part-time UI/UX Designer, balancing my commitment to a full-time Master's degree alongside project responsibilities. The design team consisted of a design lead and myself, collaborating to bring about a comprehensive and innovative transformation.

My role: UX/UI Designer

Duration: 7 months

Please note that the points below are not the entire UX Process we followed but only the parts I was involved in.

1. Comparative Analysis

During the early stages of the project, I performed a comparative analysis to gain insight into what our competitors were doing on their websites and identify their strengths and weaknesses. A total of 8 direct competitors were listed to perform the comparative analysis. Some of them were already known to the organisation whereas some were new. All the websites were analysed to identify what worked well in their website and what did not work. The document was later used to create the product strategy for our website.

Along with the analysis, I also created a library with screenshots of some of the interesting and useful components from the competitor’s site. The library consisted of components from the competitor’s websites such as headers, banners, content blocks, drop-down menus, etc. The library was later used to take reference and inspiration while creating our website.

Comparative Analysis

Reference Library

2. User Persona

Our research team interviewed different people from 3 cohorts i.e. Support Coordinator, Supported Employee and Parents. The team also generated a report based on the findings from the interview. Using the report and the data from the interview, I created a persona for each cohort. Each persona consisted of a short bio, their behaviour, touchpoint and the pain point from the persona’s perspective while using the website. These personas were used throughout the design process to build empathy with our end users, assist in making design decisions and create a deeper understanding of the needs of our target audience.

Persona - Supported Employee

Persona - Support Coordinator

Persona - Parent/Guardian

3. User Journey Map

Another artefact we created during the early discovery stage of the project was to create user journey maps. A user journey map was created to visualise the interaction process of our users and understand the experience from their point of view. At first, my design lead created 5 main goals/scopes that our 3 personas would try to achieve while using our website. A goal might be specific to only one persona or multiple personas. My role here was to visualise the steps that a persona needs to take to achieve its goal. The journey map was useful to tell if the steps in the journey were understandable and made sense, to find alternatives and shortcuts, and to check that the number of steps to reach the goal was not too long.

User Journey Map Sample

4. Wireframes

We started creating wireframes in the develop phase of the design process. We used these wireframes to demonstrate our design and content idea to the stakeholders. We gathered suggestions and feedback from our stakeholders using wireframes in the early stage of the design process. These feedback were used to update our design and create necessary improvements. Below is an example of a wireframe I created for “The Sewing Basket” page on the Achieve Australia Website.

Mid-fi Wireframe

5. Final Design

Once the wireframes were finalised, I also created high-fidelity prototypes for the wireframes I designed. A final wireframe meant that the content placeholder of the webpage was set. The next step was to put in correct content in its place, use the correct font style, font colour, images and icons etc. The content was provided by a team of content writers, and the font styles and colours were picked from the design system created by the team lead. A pool of imagery was also provided to us by the stakeholders.

Hi-fi Final Design

6. Icons

Another responsibility I took was to design icons for the website. All the icons used in the website were custom-designed. We were aiming for icons that were more than oversimplified yet not too overcomplicated with too many details. We wanted our icons to be somewhere in between. The icons were designed in Figma itself as our aim of creating simple icons did not require sophisticated tools such as Illustrator.

Customised icons

7. Reflection

Iterate as much as you can

In the early discovery stages, we explored so many different styles and layouts for the website. Although all of them did not make it to the final design, what I learnt was to keep my mind open because a design doesn’t fail, it shows us a way that doesn’t work.

Communication is the key

I learnt that for a designer, it is vital to be able to communicate and explain his work clearly and convincingly with the team and the stakeholders. Also, including everyone from the beginning of the project helped us define and project scope and MVP.

Ask for feedback

At times I found myself detached from the team and lost in my bubble of work. During this project, I learned that it is important to tap my colleagues on their shoulders (figuratively since we were working from home) and ask for feedback on your work once in a while, especially when you are feeling lost.

Remember to detach

I learned that sometimes we designers find ourselves so much attached to our work to we forget to make room for new ideas or thoughts. Detaching myself from the work, zooming out, and taking a look at the bigger picture has helped me to explore new ideas and increase productivity.