Design and process improvements at a small software company

TALtech's data industrial data collection software serves organizations from small labs to Fortune 500 companies. Initially hired for sales/admin support, I drove key modernization initiatives across documentation, web presence, and product interfaces that improved user experience and operational efficiency.

Key outcomes:

1. Reduced support call volume through improved documentation and UX

2. Modernized the company's web presence and addressing technical debt

3. Developed vision for next-gen product interface based on user research

1. Streamlining docs and resources

My direct experience with customer support revealed how scattered documentation made it difficult for both staff and customers to find information quickly. Product specifications, customer histories, and internal procedures were spread across various formats and locations, slowing down support response times.

I saw chances to improve parts of the sales, admin and support workflows closest to my role, starting with digitizing the employee guide as a searchable Notion wiki. This replaced outdated paper documentation with a central hub for procedures, templates, and troubleshooting guides. The improved organization helped us respond to customer needs more efficiently.

Our video tutorials also needed updating. The existing videos from the 90s featured dated Windows interfaces and took too long to communicate key setup steps. Referring customers to such old resources conflicted with our image as a provider of relevant, capable, and well-supported software.

I proposed making more concise and polished version of their most popular videos and handled the production process myself. That involved writing scripts informed by my customer support conversations, recording voiceovers, creating animations, and video editing.

I made new, focused tutorials that:

• Broke down complex setup processes into clear steps

• Used professional voiceovers and modern screen recordings

• Served as both setup guides and product demonstrations for prospective customers

…But customers shouldn't need to lean so much on videos or guides to perform basic setup for our products. Ideally, better interface design should address any usability issues at their source.

2. Modernizing our online presence

Now with a deeper understanding of the company's products / processes through support interactions, I was asked to help improve the user experience of their marketing website and (later) the WinWedge software interface.

The existing site had several critical issues:

• Inconsistent, 90s-looking layouts that didn't work well on mobile devices

• Navigation that changed unpredictably between pages

• A deprecated CMS that made even simple code changes and updates difficult

• Technical content that wasn't meeting customer needs

I advocated that we switch to modern site building platforms like Framer or Webflow. These would empower TALtech a more approachable CMS with WYSIWYG editing. However, the president opted for WordPress due to its popularity and hired an external WordPress agency, with my role meant to assist throughout the process.

Working with our VP of Sales, I first streamlined the site structure by:

• Reducing over 500 pages to a more focused set of content

• Reorganizing information based on common customer questions

• Creating clearer product descriptions that addressed typical confusion points

But gaps in the process became apparent as the project unfolded. The contract lacked a dedicated wireframing phase, so I was concerned that the project was missing an way to ensure the agency was fully addressing our niche product features & user needs while drafting solutions.

To address this, I sketched some rough wireframes. These involved:

• Clarifying our desired structure of pages with bespoke headings, groupings, and section priorities based on our customer knowledge.

• Distinguished product use cases on the home page, as our tech-based software names had often sent customers calling to ask

• Defined hero illustrations that would clarify each product's compatible hardware and potential integration setups

Note: These rough sketches are internal communication tools. While they may appear unpolished, they were essential to getting everyone on the same page.

As implementation progressed, new challenges emerged:

1. The project scope left little room for brand strategy or mood boarding.

2. The agency's contracted designer appeared to be spread thin across multiple projects, leaning on an existing template he had built for another company. The resulting designs felt incongruously playful and consumer-oriented for our B2B, industrial, and research-leaning user base.

3. Communication lags with the designer sometimes stretched into weeks, eventually halting completely.

I stepped up to refine and complete the designs within the constraints of the agency's WordPress plugins and Elementor, a no-code design plugin within WordPress.

My improvements included:

• Developing a more professional color palette, balancing accessibility with visual appeal by adapting Tailwind's color system to maintain consistent saturation across lightness levels

• Enhancing layout consistency and responsiveness across the site

• Refining product illustrations for a more polished, trustworthy appearance

• Reframing technical descriptions to emphasize benefits over specifications and reorganizing feature comparisons for clarity

• Overhauling the support sections, including the creation of a step-by-step WinWedge Quick Start Guide and pruning of outdated articles

While WordPress is widely used, its reliance on plugins made some of my desired design improvements more limited than I hoped. Despite these constraints, the new site had meaningful outcomes: reduced support call volume, increased engagement with key pages, and smoother customer conversations now that we had better pages to reference.

Users could now more easily navigate our offerings and grasp the value of our software. The new design offered clearer wayfinding, better info, and a more polished look that better represented TALtech's professional capabilities.

3. Modernizing the flagship software

WinWedge streamlines data collection from measuring devices into destinations like Excel. Its flexibility is a core selling point, allowing users to customize dozens of settings for bespoke workflow automation. While the core functionality was robust, its interface design created unnecessary barriers to users trying to complete basic setup.

Previously, I had created a new walkthrough video and quick start article to clarify WinWedge's many windows and settings. But without those resources, the app itself offers no visual guidance to make setup easier to intuit. The high proportion of support requests for basic operations and quick fixes signaled the need for an interface overhaul.

Key usability issues:

1. Navigation relied entirely on menu bars, forcing users through layers of fleeting menus and submenus. A menu bar can provide clear feature accessibility and consistency, but an exclusive reliance on it for all operations made it a hinderance.

2. Setup steps were split across disconnected, single-view windows, making users lose context during configuration.

3. Technical terms and unclear labels made it difficult for non-technical users to understand basic functions.

For example, the "Port Analyze" window played a key role in testing COM port settings, finding working ASCII commands, and planning data stream parsing rules—but was presented as a standalone tool rather than an integral part of the setup flow. Users would need to frequently switch between this and other windows while adjusting settings, often getting lost in the process, giving up, or and ultimately making calls to support.

Compounding the navigation problems were insufficient explanations, inconsistent layouts, and unclear labels. The "Port Analyze" window exemplifies this too:

• It presents various functions and labels data as "inputs" without clear explanations

• Ambiguous labels like "Input Data" and "Output" lack directional clarity and semantic symmetry—is data flow from WinWedge to the device, or the reverse?

• The absence of contextual help and actionable insights, combined with technical ASCII symbols, is daunting to non-technical users. "What are these for?"

The overall lack of clarity in navigation, terminology, and flow turned the software into a confusing toolbox, unnecessarily increasing the learning curve for new users.

Implementation and code considerations for the redesign

I was asked to imagine how WinWedge could evolve to better serve its users while preserving its powerful functionality. My approach focused on:

1. Studying how similar utility software handles complex workflows

2. Following Windows' native design patterns to feel familiar

3. Maintaining WinWedge's extensive customization options while making them more discoverable. Many users only interact with WinWedge when hardware changes necessitate reconfiguration, so I aimed to make this process intuitive for non-IT specialists.

To reflect TALtech's emphasis on utility over artistry and better ground the design, I studied Microsoft's WinUI documentation and component library. This helped ensure the concept would:

• Feel like a natural extension of Windows system-level apps, giving it a practical, utilitarian, and familiar feel

• Use standard OS-provided components where possible

• Maintain compatibility with existing Windows frameworks

And as a software design enthusiast and a fan of Apple's Human Interface Guidelines, I valued this opportunity to better grasp Windows' design principles and patterns.

I also considered the migration implications of the dated but widely-used Windows Dynamic Data Exchange system which WinWedge uses for non-keyboard integrations. WinUI 3 may not support DDE natively, but Windows often allows mixing backend frameworks. Could DDE work in a modern WinUI wrapper? But I caught myself overengineering prematurely. This project was only meant to be a guiding vision, so I refocused on creating a sleeker, more intuitive interface design.

Inspiration from similar utility apps

For inspiration on interaction flows, I looked to popular utility apps like Audio Hijack and Retrobatch, which feature friendly visual programming interfaces for data processing and file operation workflows. Their node-based workflow editors, where every feature, input, and output becomes a connectable block, sparked ideas for transforming transforming WinWedge into an intuitive *workflow builder* with a clear visual sequence of data processing steps.

Then I pivoted a bit. I realized that WinWedge's linear data flow didn't suit a freeform canvas, so then I looked to Apple Shortcuts' single-column approach. Apple Shortcuts' natural language writing, using fill-in-the-blank inputs within plain-English descriptions, aligned well with how our customers often described their needs in support calls: "I need to split the data using spaces into columns for the time, weight, and unit."

Single-window interface and object-oriented workflow editor

The resulting design concept centered on a single-window interface with:

• A primary, persistent canvas showing the data workflow

• A sidebar organizing setup steps and related settings logically in tabs and minimizable cards

• Clear visual guidance through the configuration process

This approach allows users to plan data workflows while testing device commands, minimizing the disorientation of the previous version.

A block-based, actions-oriented approach to building the data workflow offers several benefits:

• Visual clarity through nodes and connections, which make complex processes and relationships easier to grasp and debug.

• Intuitive editing via object-oriented, additive interactions

• Modularity and future extensibility: Each node is a self-contained action or function block, allowing for easy addition of new features and capabilities. As WinWedge evolves, TALtech could introduce modular features that users just drop into their workflows. Advanced blocks, monetized through add-ons or tiers, could enable flexible long-term growth guided by user needs.

• Progressive disclosure: Clicking on blocks reveals input flyouts with settings, reducing cognitive load and preventing overwhelming less knowledgeable users.

Some self-skepticism:

• If I were to continue iterating on this, I would reconsider making the block-based data workflow canvas completely rearrangeable. Some of the block actions actually ought to follow a specific sequence that potentially makes such flexibility unnecessary, even error-prone. Apple Shortcuts' pseudo-code approach to its workflow are undeniably powerful, but are object-oriented functions like "Get field" and "Save as variable" really useful in the context of data retrieval from serial devices? Dedicated user testing would be particularly valuable in these areas.

• I also considered including a refreshed version of the menu bar to ease the transition for longtime users, allowing interaction through both a new interface and the familiar menu hierarchy. But on closer inspection, I found that it risked muddling the new interface by distracting from the clear sequence of setup steps laid out in the sidebar navigation. I removed it for simplicity, pending user testing.

Improved copywriting, visual aids, and testing experience

I addressed smaller pain points with clearer headings and labels, action-oriented copywriting, and contextual explanations. Notable improvements include:

• Adding small icons to aid skimming and recognition.

• Renaming buttons to more clearly convey their functions; renaming “Port Analyzer” to "Port Inspector,” and making it accessible next to other settings.

• Relocating less-used features into subsections, providing some light context about their purpose.

• Other enhancements to the Port Analyzer include: (1) Clarifying the purpose of the "Command strings" section and providing guidance on using the ASCII chart for special characters; (2) Adding a "Common commands" button to surface pre-written ASCII commands based on frequent solutions from our support calls

Overall, the redesign aims to shift the user experiences from cumbersome to intuitive. By addressing key usability challenges and feedback, it has the potential to significantly improve customer setup times, reduce their reliance on support staff, and position the software as a more user-friendly solution for automated serial data collection. And by relying on native Windows system components and visual designs, the design sets up the development timeline to be potentially more cost-effective and efficient.

Reflections and leftovers

Working at TALtech taught me how to drive meaningful improvements within significant constraints—from untangling scattered documentation to reimagining core software interfaces.

Without formal research tools, my direct interactions with customers through support requests and sales interactions proved invaluable—this firsthand experience helped identify where changes would have the most impact, from documentation updates that reduced support calls to interface designs that could make complex software more approachable.

These design projects have dovetailed with a new focus on defining requirements for integrating e-commerce, license management, and customer data. This involves:

• Migrating to Stripe for e-commerce and licensing

• Outlining data migration strategies from our current fragmented systems; drafting project specs

• Working with the VP to prioritize features

• Assisting in the backend developer hiring process

• Designing a license manager that will allow customers to interact directly with our custom offline licensing system rather than having to contact support.

Working in the interplay between design, technology, and business constraints here has deepened my perspective on modernizing legacy environments. I'm eager to take this further in future roles where I can continue bridging the gap between user needs and technical possibilities.