Enterprise ERP (NDA)
2022
Project Pulse
Making complex project information easier for managers to scan, compare, and act on.
Overview
Making complex project data easier to scan
Project Pulse brings multiple project signals into a central workspace so project managers can quickly identify where attention is needed and investigate individual projects.
My contribution focused on supporting the evolution of the experience through wireframe updates, new-feature proposals, and UI standardization. I worked within an established enterprise product while building a deeper understanding of how schedules, budgets, resources, and financial information come together in project management.
The Impact
My work helped the team explore clearer ways to organize and interact with dense project information.
I contributed to new-feature wireframes that were reviewed by product managers, supported version 2 exploration, and worked on UI standardization across the experience.
The project strengthened my ability to design within a complex enterprise system where clarity, consistency, and interaction behavior are critical to decision-making.
Problem
Too much project information, not enough hierarchy
Project managers need to monitor several dimensions of a project at once — from schedules and budgets to resource allocation and financial performance.
The challenge was to bring these signals together without overwhelming the user. The experience needed to support quick portfolio-level scanning while still providing enough detail to investigate an individual project.
The design direction focused on three questions:
What needs attention?
Surface status, progress, overdue tasks, and financial signals alongside project information.
How can managers narrow the view?
Make filters visible and understandable so users can focus on the projects that matter.
How can users investigate further?
Keep relevant project details together so managers can move from scanning to deeper inspection.
Research
Building an understanding of the project manager's workspace
I worked within an existing product rather than designing Project 360 from scratch. A product walkthrough helped me understand how schedules, budgets, resources, and financial information relate to the project-management workflow.
The V2 research plan also provided direction around understanding existing usage, validating new user stories, and identifying opportunities. At the point documented in the project materials, technical-documentation analysis and internal stakeholder interviews were completed, while customer interviews and other research activities were still in progress.
Because of this, I treat the research materials as product context and research direction, rather than claiming completed research findings of my own.
What I learned
The complexity wasn't simply the amount of information on screen. It was the need to help users understand the relationship between different project signals.
This made information grouping, filtering, status visibility, and consistent interaction behavior important design considerations.
Ideation
Exploring ways to make a dense portfolio easier to scan
I explored how related project information could be grouped into a single comparison view.
The portfolio experience organized information into four major areas:
Schedule | Budget | Resourcing | Finance |
|---|
This structure allowed different project concerns to be compared within the same row instead of requiring users to move between separate views.
Making filters easier to understand
The prototype explored visible filter chips for:
Project Name
Client Name
Project Manager
Due Date
The Project Name filter included checkbox selection, a selection count, and a Select All option. An active-filter state also provided a clear way to reset the current selection.
These patterns were explored as part of the V2 design work; their impact on task completion was not measured in the available project material.
Designs
Refining the dashboard experience
Comparing projects at a glance
The portfolio view brings project signals together so managers can scan multiple projects within one workspace.
Status labels, progress indicators, overdue tasks, profitability, and invoice information appear alongside the project row, helping establish a consistent structure for comparison.
A Reminders panel also keeps pending work visible without requiring users to leave the portfolio view.
Making filter states visible
Rather than hiding filtering behind a single control, the exploration surfaced active filters directly above the tracker.
Making ownership visible
The Assigned to Me exploration introduced Project Manager information alongside the existing project signals.
One design consideration was how to balance compact rows with complete manager names. Different approaches explored truncation, popovers, and wrapped text.
This became a useful example of the trade-offs involved in designing dense enterprise tables: the interface needs to remain scannable without sacrificing information needed for identification.
Lessons
Designing for clarity means defining behavior, not just appearance
Project Pulse reinforced that enterprise UX decisions often depend on interaction details that aren't immediately visible in a polished screen.
One of my biggest takeaways was the importance of clarifying how filters, selections, metrics, and edge cases should behave before refining the visual design.
In future projects, I would establish these interaction scenarios earlier with product and engineering, document selected states and edge cases, and resolve implementation questions before moving too far into detailed design.
Working within an established enterprise system
Project Pulse also strengthened my understanding of designing within a mature product ecosystem.
The work required balancing user needs, existing UI standards, product requirements, and technical considerations — while still looking for opportunities to make complex information easier to understand.
Project Pulse was an important step in developing my enterprise UX practice: designing not only individual screens, but the relationships between information, interaction, and the decisions users need to make.
