Challenges
Beneath the Surface
The project began with discussions about enhancing the digital experience—improving layouts, streamlining navigation, modernising the look and feel. Standard website improvement work.
But as I dug deeper through existing website audits and stakeholder conversations, something didn't add up. The real friction wasn't the website—it was what came after. The 8-page Microsoft Word application form had become a barrier, creating stress for vulnerable families trying to access support and operational burden for staff trying to help them. This contradicted the charity's core mission: making essential equipment accessible to children with disabilities.
Project Objectives
Make support truly accessible
Redesign the application process to ensure all families—regardless of digital literacy, device access, or circumstance—can successfully apply with confidence.
Eliminate manual re-keying and repetitive support tasks, enabling staff to spend time where it matters most: supporting families.
Process
I led cost-effective discovery combining analytics and user research, synthesised insights through collaborative mapping to secure stakeholder buy-in, then iteratively prototyped with staff before blueprinting the complete service for implementation.
research
Synthesis
Tools & Methods
Analytics
Surveys
Interview
Personas
User journey map
Affinity mapping
Information Architecture
Service Blueprint
Sketching
Wireframing
Research
For Families: Barriers at Every Step
Using surveys, interviews, and analytics, I uncovered how the process was failing on users. The application wasn't just difficult—it was driving people away.
4.5% of users struggled to locate eligibility criteria on the website
Analytics showed repeated bouncing between pages before abandonment
Using the form itself
"A nightmare on a phone…" — Interview participant describing the mobile experience
The non-responsive Word document was essentially unusable on mobile devices
"Updates on the process, confirmation that it was received, agreed etc…" — Survey response
Families submitted applications into a void with no confirmation or status visibility
But what about the charity staff who'd worked with this system for 5+ years?
Were they truly working smoothly with this process?
Short answer: No.
For Staff: Hidden Operational Burden
Through contextual inquiry and staff interviews, I discovered the manual application created hours of avoidable work:
Manual re-typing burden
Anonymisation overhead:
Spreadsheet maintenance
Master Excel spreadsheet tracking child names, diagnoses, costs, statuses
No automation, validation, or CRM integration—pure manual data entry
Synthesis
Making Sense of the Pain
To transform raw research data into actionable insights, I facilitated collaborative workshops with the team and stakeholders using structured analysis methods.
Affinity Mapping
I led an affinity mapping session to cluster 100+ observations from user interviews, surveys, and staff shadowing.
Journey Mapping
Using Miro, I facilitated a collaborative journey mapping to visualise the dual crisis—mapping user emotions alongside staff operations revealed where pain points intersected.
Making the Problem Real
To humanise the data and ensure our solution served diverse needs, I developed three distinct personas representing our primary user groups:
John the Advocate
Parent with disabled child
Jay the Independent
Teenager with a disability
Lisa the Supporter
Professional supporting over 6 families
For each persona, I mapped their end-to-end experience—from awareness through to outcome—highlighting pain points, emotions, and opportunities at each stage.
To understand the complete service ecosystem—not just the user-facing experience—I created an "as-is" service blueprint documenting.
Hypothesis:
Designing for Transformation
By redesigning the entire application service—not just the website—we can simultaneously:
Eliminate user barriers: confidence crisis, cognitive overload, evidence anxiety
Eliminate operational waste: manual re-keying, repetitive support, spreadsheet management
Deliver measurable ROI: staff time saved, increased successful applications
Ideation
How Might We…?
I facilitated a "How Might We" workshop with the Designer to reframe problems as opportunities, generating multiple solution directions before converging on the strongest approaches.
Information Architecture
To transform the 8-page linear document into a guided digital journey, I restructured the information architecture around user mental models, not organizational requirements.
Prototyping
Bringing Ideas to Life
I prototyped a two-part system, creating intuitive lo-fi flows for both applicants and the internal staff.
For families, I designed a mobile-first "Save and Return" portal, breaking the application into manageable steps.
For staff, an admin dashboard prototype demonstrated how applications would auto-populate, eliminating all manual data entry.
I took these lo-fi prototypes directly to the staff. This feedback loop was critical. We identified the need to further personalise the dashboard and application journey for my key personas (e.g., first-time families vs. returning professionals). This feedback became the direct blueprint for developing the final, high-fidelity designs.
Final Design
Designing the Invisible:
Frontstage and Backstage
Before diving into the final interface design, I needed to answer a critical question: How does this actually work as a complete service?
A beautiful application form means nothing if the backstage processes remain broken. The service blueprint became my tool for designing the entire ecosystem—not just what users see, but how the organisation delivers.
Before finalising interfaces, I mapped the entire service ecosystem—three pathways (digital, hybrid, practitioner-assisted), CRM integration, and GDPR compliance—ensuring seamless frontstage and backstage operations.
Hi-Fi Prototype
With the service architecture validated, the high-fidelity prototype brought the strategy to life through 5 core features designed to transform anxiety into confidence.
Visual Guidance
Clear homepage with eligibility criteria, step-by-step process overview, realistic time estimates, and real photos of families helped. Families understand commitment before starting.
Interactive Eligibility Checker
Quick conversational tool confirms eligibility in minutes. Immediate feedback—"Great news! You're eligible"—or signposts alternative support, eliminating fear of wasted effort.
Personalised Profile
Parents: Manage multiple children with shared family data.
Teenagers: Age-appropriate interface building independence.
Professionals: Streamlined dashboard for multiple families.
Simplified & Supportive Application
Multi-step form with one question per page, plain language, just-in-time help, visual evidence examples, progress indicators, and save-resume functionality. Reduced completion time 56%.
Status Tracking & Support
Personal dashboard with visual timeline showing application stages, estimated timeframes, next steps, and direct messaging. Families stay informed without anxious phone calls.
Impact
Beyond the Numbers
While the service is currently in implementation (pre-launch), the designed solution is projected to deliver:
56%
faster completion (90 → 40 minutes)—enabling families to focus on their child, not paperwork.
0
manual data entry — seamless CRM integration eliminates 30 minutes of re-keying per application
< 1
support contact per application — compared to ~3 calls with the old process
We transformed a process that caused anxiety into one that builds confidence—fulfilling the charity's mission to make support genuinely accessible.
Evidence-led design drove strategic change. The charity shifted from a cosmetic website refresh to comprehensive service redesign based on research findings—proving that understanding the complete service ecosystem delivers measurable value for vulnerable users and operational efficiency for staff.
Key Takeaways
Reflections
Empathy Drives Consensus
Data alone doesn't persuade. When stakeholders saw the collaborative journey map—connecting user emotional distress to staff operational burden—resistance dissolved. Visualisation made the invisible work visible, transforming abstract problems into shared understanding.
The Power of Evidence Over Assumptions
This project reinforced that investing in discovery prevents building the wrong thing. By starting with low-cost research—analytics, shadowing, then interviews—I uncovered the real barriers families and staff faced, which shaped a service transformation rather than surface-level fixes.
Next Steps
The service is currently in technical development, with CRM integration, GDPR-compliant architecture, and accessible front-end build underway alongside staff training and change management. Post-launch, we'll track completion rates, support contact volume, manual data entry elimination, and user satisfaction through analytics and quarterly feedback sessions.