Using Task Flows to Map Screens
This week moved the needle away from abstraction and encouraged me to start thinking about how a real-life professional development mobile app for UW-Madison students would work. For this assignment, I created five different task flows for key tasks users would do in the app. My process started at the beginning of the user’s journey with my app, which is currently called “BadgerWorks.” I mapped out a profile creation process because one of the core components of the design idea is each profile receives a unique skill roadmap based on profile data.
The second task flow I mapped was the user journey of accessing the skill roadmap and completing a minigame. This task flow borrows elements from existing apps like Duolingo, and Finch as the have similar gamification features. The screen layout is purposefully derivative of others apps because I want to make the minigame feature familiar to users.
After finishing the second task flow, I wrestled my approach to the app’s information architecture. I thought how users would best navigate the app? I adopted a multi-leveled tree approach approach using four main tiles users can access at major points in navigation. At certain points in navigation users linearly go through screens to complete tasks like completing a minigame or searching for community. My reasoning for this is planted in information foraging theory and giving users easily traceable “information scents.” I tried to make links (tiles) plainly displayed and plan to use iconography to indicate each tile’s purpose.
Get Hunter McCormick’s stories in your inbox
Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.
With four tiles constraining the navigation, I had to ideate on how I could ensure each remaining tile would represent a core feature of the app while also addressing the problem statement of making students feel more connected, and knowledgeable while on their professional development journey at UW-Madison.
Drawing off of my idea from last week’s sketch, I created a task flow for joining communities within the app. The third tile integrated an AI chatbot, the principle idea that was foundational to last semester’s research. This task flow focused on making students more knowledgeable and plays off personalization needs derived from research. My final task flow was sending a user’s resume to a friend. This plays off the social aspect of the app and I plan to flesh this portion out in future designs. At this point I acknowledged how deep organization is constructed which may need to be improved in the future to reduce user confusion.
Creating the five task flows caused me to think critically about app layout, and information architecture. It was also great practice to think about screen details like the size of buttons, what are the most important aspects of addressing the design problem. The task flows will be a foundational reference as I flesh the designs out further. I have already began noticing how the apps I use are purposefully (or not) set up to maximize navigation.
