Google Calendar
Increasing productivity and engagement by streamlining scheduling processes.
My Role
UX Researcher
UX/UI Designer
Interaction Designer
Platform
Website feature
Duration
May - June 2024
5 weeks
Google Calendar has over 1 billion users as one of the leading applications for productivity and scheduling.
It’s main function is to schedule events and tasks, with the ability to invite others, link meetings, files, and notes. Google Calendar allows for add-ons and extensions to enhance its capabilities, covering a wide range of needs from personal to professional.
GOAL
Design a feature for Google Calendar that increases productivity and user engagement by streamlining collaborative scheduling processes.
BACKGROUND
Scheduling events with other people is one of the most common functions on Google Calendar, whether for professional meetings or personal hangouts, but communicating with attendees can be tedious and stressful.
Google Calendar has collaborative scheduling functions, but many of them are overlooked, require you to add contacts by email and share calendars, or need to be used in conjunction with other messaging features to communicate clearly.
In personal experience, I’ve had to use other scheduling platforms such as Calendly or When2Meet, and faced challenges getting my settings to sync or remembering to transfer information.
What challenges do people face when scheduling collaborative events?
RESEARCH
First, let’s get to know our landscape and challenges. I conducted a competitive SWOT analysis, focusing on collaborative features and comparing them with Google Calendar’s capabilities.
By observing the features that are prioritized in competitors, I was already getting the sense that users’ top priorities are efficiency and customizability.
From here, I wanted to better understand users’ scheduling habits, needs, and frustrations on a personal level.
User Interviews
5 participants, 4 remote + 1 in person
I conducted 5 user interviews with people who regularly use Google Calendar.
I found that the main reasons people use a calendar is to keep things organized and reduce the stress in remembering events and details about them.
The main pattern I found is:
People want to communicate clearly about plans with as little manual effort as possible.
They want to understand other people’s schedules at a glance without having to discuss and be reminded and send reminders about events without extra back-and-forth.
I created an affinity map sorting by pain points, needs, and motivations to organize and understand my user better.
Setting the course ...
I need to design a feature that focuses either speeds up, automates, or eliminates the need for interactions between event attendees.
It must be easy to use, require little to no effort after initially being set up, and integrate seamlessly into Google Calendar by using existing design patterns and flows.
DEFINE
To understand this information from the eyes of my users, I summarized it into two personas: Susan Dawson who represents people who do more complex, work-related scheduling, and Anand who represents people who use Google Calendar more for personal events and planning.
Susan is a busy project manager. She struggles to communicate the nuances of her schedule and handle the many reminders and follow ups surrounding her events.
She needs a way to relay information in a quick and efficient way that requires minimal supervision.
Anand is a pre-med student who struggles to balance courses with personal life. It’s hard to organize plans with others who have very different schedules.
He needs a way to clearly communicate and understand his availability.
I decided to use Susan as my primary persona since I found from my research that the most complex problems with collaborative scheduling typically relate to work events rather than personal events.
If I design for the more complex issues, there is a chance that it could also apply to simpler scheduling frustrations.
IDEATE
After brainstorming a list of features supported by my research, I found that the types of features that would best meet my users’ goals would be ones that automate and organize.
This led me to a workflow feature that automates actions for specific events, reducing the stress and effort involved in manually overseeing them.
How does this feature tie into business goals?
I created 2 user flows: Even creation + tags, and creating a workflow. Users would be able to associate workflows with certain tags, having the programed action occur for all the events tagged with the same.
Low-Fidelity Wireframes
Desktop or mobile...?
Based on the flows, I drew up the key screens that would be involved, taking inspiration from other platforms that have these features such as Calendly or the tag function in Notion.
I began to design for the mobile app, but one of the biggest issues I had was understanding Google Calendar’s design patterns for the mobile app as many of the more complex screens and features are not as easily accessible.
It was at this time that I decided to do more research and take an informal survey on whether people use the desktop or mobile app more for scheduling on Google Calendar.
First, I found that the majority of users use the desktop app to manage their schedules and the mobile app to view their schedules on the go. And second, I realized that the Google Calendar already has a feature called “Labels” that can be created and associated with certain calendars, much like the tag feature I was trying to develop.
So, I made a pivot to design for the desktop app, utilizing the existing “Labels” feature to avoid redundancy.
The main point of access would be through the notification when creating a new event to create easy access by utilizing the natural flow users take when accessing Google Calendar.
The secondary point of access would be through a tab in the side menu bar. I wanted to choose some place visible but not intrusive.
Create a workflow
Created workflow
Informational slideshow
Following Google Calendar’s current design patterns for new features
ITERATE + VALIDATE
To validate the usability of this feature so far, I conducted a usability test.
Usability Testing pt 1
4 moderated usability tests, remote
The main issues came from navigating to the workflow feature. Once users were filling out the form to create a workflow they had no issue, This meant that I had to reconsider hierarchy and how to make the “new” notices more visible.
I also found that people who were more familiar with managing work-related events and scheduling automations found this feature a lot more easy to understand. Some users were confused about the concept of a workflow itself.
Iterating on our feedback ...
Clearer notification + navigation
Users said it was difficult to notice the new feature at first and wanted a clear direct link to the workflow feature.
In addition to the notice that leads to the informational slideshow, there is now a large CTA that opens to the Workflows feature.
Updated “event type”
Users were confused about which events would be associated with the workflow.
I changed it so that users select a calendar and then a label (given that the user had created labels for the chosen calendar). This follows the pattern of selecting a calendar when creating an event.
* I acknowledged that this would be clearer to users on their own account where they are familiar with their personal calendars and labels
Event-specific customizability
Some users wanted more customizability with the workflows such as an easy way to turn it off for a specific event.
Changed the text to say what the workflow is for clarity and added a link icon to be able to unlink or link the workflow to the event easily.
After these iterations, I decided to test again to further validate my solutions.
Usability Testing pt 2
5 moderated usability tests, remote
Overall, users found the feature easy to understand and that it would improve their scheduling processes. Users said that they would be able to figure out how to customize this feature to their own calendar according to their needs.
The main feedback was about the link icon, as some users didn’t notice it or were confused as to what it did.
And iterating some more ...
Along with iterations to the link icon, I made adjustments to some wordings and flows to make the feature even more seamless and effortless.
FINAL DESIGN
Introducing... Workflows!
A seamless automation feature that increases efficiency by decreasing the need to my regulate repetitive tasks surrounding events, allowing you to focus on the important things.
Create a new
workflow straight from your event.
Easy access to the feature that utilizes a user’s natural flow on Google Calendar.
Simple and quick with templates to make your life even easier.
Create a workflow in under a minute with minimal effort.
Toggle workflows off/on for event-specific customization.
Easily maintain control over your events.
Easily accessible without intruding on your workspace.
Quickly access and edit your workflows at any time.
IMPACT + NEXT STEPS
With this feature, Google Calendar users are able to increase efficiency and clarity in communication, with minimal effort.
With its current functionings, the Workflows feature satisfies our users’ needs, but to enhance this feature I would explore:
REFLECTION
Never overlook product research
I realized just how essential it is to understand not just the design system itself, but the current functions of the product you’re working with. My goal in adding a feature was to create something that makes users’ flows easier, not create more frustration in trying to figure out how to use it. This meant making it work together with existing features and ensuring that it wasn’t redundant.
Design with flexibility to accommodate a diverse range of users
Throughout my research, I found that range of activities users complete on Google Calendar varies widely depending on their life stage or personal habits. Some users relied heavily on the “Find a time” feature while some users didn’t know it existed. Though I defined my target user for this project, I knew that there are other types of users on Google Calendar who could completely disregard the feature if it wasn’t necessary for their needs. With this in mind, I knew that I had to design the feature to be accessible to those who need it while remaining non-intrusive for those who don’t.
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