Discuss is a B2B qualitative research platform that provides comprehensive tools for scheduling, conducting, and analyzing research. A key feature of Discuss is its support for live video interviews, allowing users to conduct and record interview sessions directly within the platform. Additionally, users have the option to upload sessions recorded elsewhere into the platform for a fee.
In this case study, I detail my redesign of the platform's recording upload process—which was driven by an influx of new customer demands. As a result of my redesign, I resolved a long-standing customer request and significantly reduced task completion time.
Lead Designer
Discuss
Web
UX/UI Design, User Flows, Wireframes, Prototypes
Uploads of off-platform recordings on Discuss have historically seen minimal interest and usage. However, this changed with the recent release of Genie, our generative AI tool that creates text-based summaries of interview recordings. What used to take days to extract insights from a set of recordings could now be accomplished in minutes.
This new capability generated significant interest from clients, with several expressing the desire to start projects exclusively containing off-platform research for use with Genie. One client, in particular, planned to upload and summarize hundreds of hours of video content.
Despite the growing demand, our existing file upload flow was inadequate for this use case, as it only allowed for one file to be uploaded at a time among other limitations. To capitalize on the interest in summarizing off-platform research, we needed to redesign and streamline our file upload experience.
By targeting usability heuristics that the existing flow fell short of, I designed a new and streamlined upload experience that benefits new and existing users alike. As a result of this redesign, I was able to:
Diagram of original upload user flow. Steps that were removed in the final flow are marked with a red 'X.'
The final delivered upload flow
Although I left the company before I could see my designs implemented and their impact on users, some of the projected outcomes were:
Comparisons of these numbers for customers with Genie subscriptions vs. customers without Genie subscriptions could also help illustrate how my redesigned upload flow impacted the above metrics without the influence of Genie.
Prototype demonstrating the finalized flow that I designed for uploading off-platform research (start by scrolling down).
I started this project in November 2023 as the Design Lead and worked in a small team consisting of a Product Manager and an Engineer Lead. I was responsible for all UX and UI design and worked on this project from end-to-end, up until handoff of my designs to the Engineer Lead.
Responsibilities:
I began this project before all of its requirements were officially defined, with the understanding that additional ones would be provided later by the Product Manager. The only requirement I had at the beginning was that the new upload flow must support multiple files per upload.
To kick off my design process, I performed an informal heuristic evaluation of the existing upload flow using Nielsen Norman's 10 usability heuristics. During this evaluation, I identified three primary heuristics where our current flow fell short and used those to guide my design decisions throughout the project. These three heuristics were...
"Minimize the user's memory load by making elements, actions, and options visible. The user should not have to remember information from one part of the interface to another."
To begin a file upload, users must first navigate to the Recordings page (Steps 1 and 2 below). Next, they must expand a dropdown titled "Tools & Downloads" (Step 3) and then select the upload option within the dropdown (Step 4). The buried placement of this entry point forces users to search for it and harms feature discoverability for new users.
Numbered callouts (1-4) depicting the steps required to begin the existing file upload flow
"The design should always keep users informed about what is going on, through appropriate feedback within a reasonable amount of time."
After a video file is uploaded to Discuss it must undergo post-processing before it becomes visible in the platform. Post-processing usually takes more time than the initial file upload itself. However, there are no progress indicators or any mention that this is a required step. This can cause confusion for the user when their file upload is "completed" but the video is nowhere to be found and will be even more of an issue once multiple files can be uploaded at a time.
"Shortcuts — hidden from novice users — may speed up the interaction for the expert user so that the design can cater to both inexperienced and experienced users."
Not only are users forced to begin an upload from the Recordings page, they also must specify the language of each file before they can upload it. The amount of clicks this requires makes for a frictional experience. In total, it takes 8 clicks minimum to upload a file when starting from the home page of the platform and 6 clicks minimum to upload a file starting from the Recordings page.
Breakdown of Upload Flow Clicks:
Diagram of the current upload flow which takes 8 clicks to open the file picker, select a file, specify language, and upload it.
My first round of designs focused on:
Overview page design with newly added section for uploading off-platform research
New Upload section designs with drag-and-drop functionality and upload status
After receiving feedback from the Product team during a design critique, my next iterations revolved around:
Next iteration of Upload Recordings section and Upload Progress Cards
I also explored alternate designs of the file upload status cards that included progress steppers, as I thought that informing users of all the steps involved up front would be helpful. In the end, I opted for a plainer design with no stepper as this design choice was based on a hunch and adding one would introduce more complexity for the engineers.
Exploration of various Upload Progress Card designs with steppers to give users additional context into the upload process.
At this point, I formally met with the Lead Engineer to discuss my designs and their feasibility in depth. This conversation was insightful and revealed several things contrary to my initial design assumptions:
I worked with him to revise my designs so that they adhered to technical constraints and minimized engineering debt, while still delivering the optimal user experience that I envisioned.
My final iterations resulted in:
Final designs for various Upload Section states (empty, uploaded, error, limit reached)
Final page designs (Overview page empty state, Upload in progress state, Overview page uploaded state, and Recordings page with new dropdown menu design)
This was the first project at Discuss where I had a dedicated Engineer Lead that I could consult and work with during my design process. Having this resource and additional perspective to help guide my design decisions was invaluable. However, this project was not without its hiccups.
Due to differing schedules and priorities, the Engineer Lead wasn't able to validate my initial design proposals with a proof-of-concept until after I had already done several rounds of iterations. This revealed several incorrect technical assumptions that I had made, requiring me to revise my work.
Despite this, I had prepared several alternative designs in the event that my favored design solution did not pan out. Together, we reviewed these designs and devised an optimal workaround. I was then able to confidently deliver an improved final solution that met our design, technical, and business requirements.
This new upload flow would not have been possible, or would have at least taken much longer to produce, had I not been able to work so closely with an Engineer Lead. I look forward to future projects where I have the privilege of designing with and learning from developers, and am excited to see what we can accomplish.
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