Background: Speculative Project
Role: Product Designer
Timeline: 2 weeks
Problem
This project starts with my own frustration with Slack. While Slack remains a valuable communication tool, it can also be frustrating when you are navigating a very long thread, or trying to retrieve a message you just read but get lost in the over 20 channels you are in. This results in time wasted and potential information loss, undermining the otherwise positive impact of Slack on workflow collaboration.
How can we enhance overall user productivity and ensure seamless communication across diverse channels?
Process
Empathize
Secondary research - understanding the problem space
Primary research - understanding the users' need
With the help of survey, I now have a more comprehensive view of users’ experience with slack, and I can also shape the direction of interview based on survey’s finding.
After collecting some useful user data from the survey, I scheduled 2 user interviews with slacks’ heavy users to gather more in-depth insight about their experience with slack.
Mapping research findings
I mapped out the data from primary research, enabling me to pinpoint insights and formulate design concepts tackling overarching challenges.
Redefine
Redefine the problem to form design stretagy
Upon condensing the research findings, I restructured the problem into three distinct aspects and pinpointed three design strategies. This approach ensured research findings are applied to form design solutions.
Solutions
Directly reply to a specific message
Enabling users to respond to specific messages within a thread ensures that all messages can be viewed in their appropriate context, eliminating the need to dig through the entire thread. This approach mitigates the potential for misunderstandings and enhances clarity.
View related thread in one panel, no more cross-talk
Enabling replies to specific messages provides users the opportunity to initiate seperate conversations within a single thread. By incorporating a "View related thread" feature, users can further access separate discussions through dedicated panels.
New thread overview penal, shortcut to threads and discussions
With a new accordion panel at the top part of each channel, users now can quickly overview every thread in very channel. Additionally, users can conveniently pin essential threads to the top for easy access.
Segment channels using slackbot
Use slackbot to segment channels into different sections and continually update each section base on slackbot's suggestions.
Preview messages to quickly identify the right channel
Users can now preview the latest messages in channels and direct messages, providing them with a concise overview of each channel's activity without requiring them to individually open each channel.
