Creating Engagement with Enhancing Dashboards.
Dashboarding tools are essential to enable user's daily decision making and also to surface where potential issues could raise.
Overview
Within the SmartDiagnostics application existed a feature called "Maps", which was highly referenced by reliability engineers to get a view of number of Alerts within a location. This was a feature that many plants would have displayed on monitors and referenced in passing to gain quick insights.
The Problem Statement
"Maps" was an incredibly one-dimensional view that offered metrics that could be continuously changing without any reference to where the root problem existed. The Maps only displayed one metric, which was alerts, that offered little information other than a total number. Users would have to leave the Map view in order to sort through Trend data to uncover root causes. Many users, specifically Plant Managers, were not versed enough with trend data in order to articulate whether or not an alert was worth investigating.
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Imagine coming into a view of a plant and only seeing red dots signifying alerts. Your initial thought process may be instant panic in thinking each alert was cause for investigation.
Dashboard Goals
Create an interface where users could easily apply different data visualizations and metrics within one click.
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Create paths to enable users to drill down from a higher level view to be able to hone into problem areas.
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Maintain and enhance current "maps" functionality, allowing users to display metrics across multiple locations; adding areas to drill down from location to systems and assets.
Research
I conducted user interviews to uncover what metrics are desired in order to transition Maps into a robust Dashboard with the right data visualizations. Initial user interviews returned a short list of metrics that were applicable to each industry. In order to verify the findings, a short survey was sent out to our internal team and 100 users to ensure that we could prioritize the right metrics upfront.
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After the metrics were verified, I collaborated with engineers to ensure data metrics are available. After presenting engineers with the list, we were able to narrow down which metrics we would be able to integrate immediately and which could be pushed for future enhancements.
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User flows were created to articulate pathways for drill down functionality. Used to show back-end engineers to ensure all APIs are aligned.
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Prototypes
The Dashboard Landing Page
The Dashboard's Landing Page was designed to give users a means to navigate to pre-set systems that displayed the information and data that was frequently accessed. Each Dashboard that was created still maintained the ability to sort through different metrics and a means of drilling down or up into other views.
Drill Down Functionality
Since the Maps feature was currently existing with information already displayed, we were able to take that existing functionality and create a framework of filters and updated UI to help differentiate locations, systems and assets. The initial map only displayed dots with the total number of alerts and gave no means to drill down. These pathways were connected to give the user the ability to select a location, system or asset and display the corresponding image and data.
Quick Filtering Functionality
The filtering functionality was designed to give user's the ability to quickly toggle between metrics and data visualizations. The top line of Dashboards, would allow users to quickly access existing presets from the Dashboard Landing. Users could also quickly select their metric, data visualizations and time range from drop downs that would update in real time.
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To keep user's oriented to their views, a breadcrumb trail of Corporation/Location/System/Asset was displayed with the ability to quickly move to any level.
A tertiary master filter was also appended to give users a more in-depth means of filtering for the information that was relevant to them. This filter could be used to refine displayed information further, giving access to refine by asset types and different levels of the systems. (seen below)
No Image, No Problem
In some instances, there would not be an image associated with a level that was selected to display. Creating a default table view still allowed the data and metrics to be displayed, but offering an opportunity for a user to quickly import an image directly within the view, allowed for expansion of information.
When entering a view, for the first time, a modal would display giving the user an opportunity to upload an image or view the information as a table. If a user opted out of uploading an image, a quick means to "add map" was featured in the bottom left hand corner, which is the same area that a user would use to access editing capabilities.
Full Screen View
It was essential to create a full screen view to display metrics as a majority of users would display this data on monitors and tv screens throughout different areas of their plants. This helped to articulate any major issues in real time. The focus on being able to drill down or change the information was not as essential at this level since the information displayed was typically relevant to the area it was being displayed.