Inclusive Time Management Tool: MOKA
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Experience Design, User Research, UX Design, Design Psychology
Fall 2021
Collaborators: CC / DL / CC / SL
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MOKA is a time management app design that betters experience by focusing on decision making styles and positive human emotion design.
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UX Techniques Used
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User Interviews
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User Persona
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User Flow
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Wireframing and Prototyping
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Usability Testing and Iteration
My Role
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UX Researcher
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UI/UX Designer
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Branding Design
Tools Used
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Figma
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Microsoft Word and Excel
Problem Statement
According to studies conducted by the Psychological Bulletin, research shows that “procrastination chronically affects 15%-20% of adults and that approximately 25% of adults think of procrastination to be a defining personality trait for themselves (Steel, 2007).
Interestingly, college students make up a huge portion of this group; 80%-95% of university students procrastinate to some extent, 70% consider themselves to be procrastinators, and roughly 50% think they procrastinate consistently in a problematic way (Steel, 2007).
Procrastination goes hand-in-hand with mental health issues and the overall human well-being, leading those who procrastinate to be more susceptible to depression and anxiety. Therefore, we wanted to create “a human-centered time-management tool that empowers those who suffer from the issue of procrastination in their daily context.”
The project led to the development of Moka, an app for college students that hopes to help diminish the frequency of procrastination and promote healthy work habits and organization.
01 Preliminary Research
Preliminary Research
Existing Industry Examples of Time Management Tools
To understand how we can tackle the problem, we researched existing products, both physical and digital, that help reduce procrasination and help with time management, Here are some of this examples:
Understanding Different Motivation Types
Design for Human-Centered Time-Management Interfaces to Beat Users' Procrastination
Phase 1 of the project enables us to explore the issues of people’s procrastination habits in daily contexts so we can effectively design a product that accommodates to the three areas of the continuum holistically; in terms of the technology-specific task, technology-mediated behavior, and technology supported life experiences.
Exploring the four different approaches enables finding a product scope that accommodates time management for a user that holistically represents a larger and more inclusive population size.
After discussion among the group members, we decided that we would go about a virtual time-management application that helps contribute to social behavior change. We assembled aspects from our four previous design examples that we deemed beneficial and crucial to a successful product:​
This application has four variations of this application that include varying features and accommodates for people of the four design directions. The following are the design considerations for each type of user we learned from Phase 1:
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02 Design
Design Concept
We proposed an app extension that connects to Canvas and syncs with the user’s class schedule, assignment deadlines, exam dates, and to-dos, yet still leaves room for customization. Our app takes into account the decision-making style of the user and adjusts the interface accordingly to best accommodate their behavior, ultimately improving the user’s time management skills.
Specific Features
The app will include the following features. The features are listed by the order of the user flow.
Preliminary decision-making style quiz: Prompts a series of questions to determine what kind of decision-maker the user is.
Calendar importation: Users can connect to Canvas and sync their schedules/syllabus
Visual elements/data organization: Users can build their schedule like a puzzle
Data recording: Provide users a place to write a To-Do List
Notification and reminder system: Users will receive notifications about upcoming deadlines
Reward system: Personalized encouragement and fulfillment (ie.: to cross-off tasks and show progress with the use of trees/buildings)
Customization: Users can organize the app features as they like (i.e.; color, font, visibility)
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The app accommodates for multiple user types by asking them to complete a short questionnaire prior to usage. They will be asked questions that help determine their decision making style.
The app prioritizes the user’s answers and incorporates these behaviorisms into the app flow. As explained previously, maximizers seeks opportunities in the quantity of design choices and constantly aim to find the best solution. If a user chooses to answer a question that deems them as a maximizer, their app features will be reflected with this. An example would be giving them the opportunities of customization in a calendar feature, users can take charge in the organization of their assignments and deadlines.
The app’s features will generally remain the same across the four different user types but have small changes that better suit their needs.
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The design is able to adapt to the 2x2 matrix and the decision-making styles and motivation types by providing users with a variety of real time responses that take their decision making styles and motivation types into consideration. the app aims to assist users in task formulation and completion and ensures accessibility in doing so.
Our solution: Accommodating to the needs of four different user types
Decision-Making Style Test
Before the app imports all of the information from Canvas it will ask the user a series of questions that help determine their decision-making style. At any time, the user can retake this test if they feel like the interface is not best suited for their time management needs.
A sample questions could be:
03 Wireframes
Mid-Fidelity Wireframes and Features
Connect to Canvas
â—‰ Connect to the Canvas
â—‰ Access academic plans
Calendar Modification
Key component of our application:
â—‰ Fixed class times Reminder for class schedule and allow the user to see exactly when they will be busy or free that day
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â—‰ Upcoming tasks The bottom dock displays upcoming assignment/ meetings by accessing the Canvas’ Assignment & To-Do feature
Information Input
â—‰ The assignments on the bottom are organized chronologically by deadlines so the user can easily see what to prioritize
â—‰ The user can long-press to gain the detailed information of each assignment and get a sense of how much time should be imputed for each task
â—‰ Cubes are color-coded in consistent with Canvas homepage
Drag & Drop
â—‰ Habit growth At the beginning of each day, a user is encouraged to evaluate their free time and organize their schedule
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â—‰ Drag & Drop the tasks from the bottom window into 30-min time slots
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â—‰ “Other” block The user can also fill in their to-dos beyond Canvas-provided tasks
Countdown Clock
â—‰ Mitigate phone-distractions Once starting a task, a countdown clock will appear, disabling notifications or other apps
â—‰ Accessing other apps would trigger a variety of feedbacks (depending on the user’s decision-making style):
â—‹ Paused/ended countdown
â—‹ Task marked as postponed/fail
â—‹ Etc.
â—‰ User can choose Quit to accommodate the changes in schedule
Complete and Incomplete Tasks
â—‰ Swipe When a user completes a task, they can swipe it right to mark it as Complete If the user does not complete the task in the allotted time slot, then they must swipe it left to mark it as Later
â—‰ Varied type of feedback for task-(in)completion based on user’s types
â—‹ Using a mild reminder like Later helps to minimize stress
â—‹ Using strong words like Incomplete, Overdue, or Missing’ would stimulate improved behavior...
04 Final Screens
MOKA’s branding and design
focuses on the experience of
drinking a cup of coffee. This is
something that reminds us of the
college studying night experience.
92% of college students drink
coffee.
MOKA users’ cups will slowly see
a decrease in liquid quantity as a
task session nears the end. They
will also gain beans as a reward
after completing tasks
Solutions Overview
Features that users find useful:
- Remind users of important events
- Calendar view
- Personalized scheduling
- Remind users of unfinished tasks
- Checklist/To-dos
- Reminders
- Stickers
- Motivate users to finish tasks
- Reward/punishment
Effectiveness and Usefulness
Moka has effectively responded to our major users, students. As mentioned above, based on the comprehensive research on the working habits of the student population, MOKA improved the common pitfalls of common time management tools currently available in the market on 1) Convenience, 2) Accessibility, and 3) Feedback.
Convenience of immediate linkage between Moka and academic softwares, such as Canvas, eliminates the need to manually enter academic goals and deadlines, and automatically updates from instructor with changes like submission status or deadline changes. Accessibility is embodied in its virtual properties: this application reinforces time management via virtual attractiveness than any additional product acquisition which would increase access barriers; visualization of academic plans with tools such as task lists and pop-up reminders, made the syllabus and schedules easier to follow and work efficiently. Feedback was supported by group analysis and summary of decision types surveys; the interface was constantly revised acknowledging user individuals and specific task types–our final prototype derived a number of branches to achieve an optimized balance between motivation and personalized alerts.
At this point, Moka’s future vision is to further extend its appeal to the student community by giving them more substantial assistance in overcoming procrastination, such as actual rewards like coffee vouchers, academic rewards like extra credit, etc.
Reflection and Experience
Our Project Experience
Challenges and Solutions
There were many challenges we faced throughout our project timeline. Whether it was ensuring deadlines, making sure we had all our desired features, creating our Qualtrics survey, and data analysis, our goal was to make sure our project was inclusive and followed our assignment rubric. This was difficult at times because it was a group project so distributing and assigning tasks within the group needed to be done in a timely manner. In the end, we assigned tasks based off our own decision-making and time management styles. By setting these expectations for each other in the beginning of the project work sessions for each individual phase, we were able to effectively work according to our schedules and plan for deadlines comfortably. For many of our members, it was our first time using Qualtrics so we had to learn this application and apply what we learned almost immediately. Fortunately, we were able to figure out this application quickly and distribute our survey accordingly. Overall, our project experience was positive and we all felt we benefited and learned from this time management tool project. We all collectively felt that MOKA was an app we would all use ourselves if it was actually created.
What We Learned
This project has taught us a lot about the design process and what it means to create a holistic and inclusive design. The variety of needs and considerations regarding users’ decision-making styles and motivation types that we were challenged showed us the importance of planning and testing in product design. We also learned the importance of timeliness and organization because though we distributed our surveys and prototype screens at our designated time, receiving feedback and data may not always go as planned.
Suggestions
With this project’s emphasis on the users’ decision-making styles and motivation types, the lengthy process of data collection and analysis was the most difficult for us. We struggled with trying to come up with solutions that weren’t redundant and fit the user type needs. We suggest that asking users directly what they wanted and liked about other similar products or solutions were the most direct way to find ideas for our project. After collecting this information, we delved into these solutions ourselves and researched what these solutions had to further incorporate them into our project.