kinnect by kinkofa

  • TEAM

    Ellie Tsuji

    Adithi Deepak

    Julie Fields

  • FOCUS

    iOS app design

  • TOOLS

    Maze

    Figma

    Google Workspace

  • TIMELINE

    3 weeks

my role
UX Planning Lead, UX Designer

I led a team of four, conducting daily scrums, delegating tasks, and providing updates, resulting in the timely completion of design deliverables.

I oversaw the research and design strategy by conducting user interviews, moderating feature prioritization workshops and usability tests, and ensuring team alignment with every design iteration.

overview

The Problem

The Family Reunion Conundrum -

As the excitement for family reunions builds, families face a common dilemma: How do they ensure the preservation of cherished traditions when the planning process lacks active engagement from family members?

Goals

We developed the first iOS mobile application platform for kinkofa, providing a seamless and collaborative family reunion planning experience across generations.

client

kinkofa’s (KIN·koh·fah) mission is to bring generations together to uncover, record, and preserve Black family stories with pride and dignity. It is the only digital family history platform specifically made to reconnect Black families.

context

cultural awareness

Before researching the event planning industry and getting to know our users, we first needed to understand the historical and cultural significance of family reunions to the Black community. 

Family reunions have deep historical roots, they date back to Emancipation when formerly enslaved people sought to reconnect with separated family members.

In recent times, family reunions continue the theme of reconnecting to one’s roots, strengthening family ties, and celebrating cultural traditions. 

By drawing these parallels, we can understand how the tradition of Black family reunions celebrates resiliency, cultural preservation, and the enduring importance of family connections across generations and time.

This context enabled us to formulate experiences that are authentic to our users.

project background

praxis

This client project served as the culmination of General Assembly’s User Experience Design course. Getting matched with kinkofa fostered an opportunity to build practical experience working with real-world clients and hone skills in crafting solutions to meet the client and target audience’s needs.

competitive analysis

understanding the space

Conducting a competitor analysis of event planning platforms revealed industry gaps, competitor strengths, weaknesses and opportunities for differentiation.

discovery

understanding our user

After conducting user interviews with a list of provided contacts from kinkofa, who represent the target audience, combined with other recruited individuals who posses knowledge of the event planning space, we gained a better understanding of the behaviors, needs, and pain points of the user.

What is working?

Family reunions facilitate the preservation and celebration of Black family heritage, cultivating stronger familial connections.

what is not working?

Family reunion planners juggle multiple tasks and tools to executive the event.

what could be enhanced?

Family reunion planners often bear the majority of the responsibilities when organizing and executing the event and ensuring the tradition of family reunions continues.

define

persona

Our primary persona is an experienced family reunion planner who is deeply motivated by maintaining family connections and preserving their heritage. Despite their proven success in organizing reunions, they grapple with the challenge of sustaining this momentum over time.

opportunity

how might we...

…develop an inclusive and collaborative platform that allows family members to contribute to the planning and executing of family reunions and continue family traditions?

design

User flows

Creating user flows visually mapped out the journey users take within the product, ensuring a clear understanding of their interactions while optimizing their experience for seamless task completion. 

Task 1 & 2

Barbara invites a new planning committee member and assigns them a task. 

Task 3 & 4

Create an album and share photos and videos

Wireframes and prototypes

mid and high-fidelity

We converted our user flows, also known as our solution concepts, into tangible design solutions - resulting in two versions of testable prototypes.

While the Design Lead spearheaded the design decisions, I ensured that the wireframes were meeting brand guidelines and that we were allotted enough time for multiple design iterations if needed.

usability testing

round 1 test plan

Contained the mid-fidelity prototype. We prompted our test participants to complete Tasks 1 and 2. This round tested the platform’s function and flow.

round 1. mid-fidelity prototype

After onboarding, users are greeted with this homepage.

From the event’s page, users can add/remove planning committee members.

Each planning committee member can be assigned tasks that are visible to all committee members.

round 2 testing

Contained the high-fidelity prototype. We prompted our test participants to complete Tasks 1 through 4. This round tested the platform’s function, flow and heuristics/overall usability.

As a bonus, Round 2 of testing also included improvements to the prototype based on feedback collected from Round 1.

round 2. high-fidelity prototype

Improved homepage

Planner view of the events page

Planner view of the task dashboard

usability test Results

round 1

100% task completion rate. However, there were suggestions to:

  • Improve how we phrased the task in the test plan so that participants are given a clearer starting point for the prototype

  • Improve icon labeling to be more intuitive

  • Improve the call-to-action copy on a few high-touch buttons to be more intuitive

round 2

100% task completion rate.

However, the task of sharing photos from the album resulted in the highest misclick rate of 62.5%. This came as no surprise because users reported experiencing difficulty navigating that portion of the prototype. We acknowledged that the information architecture needed improvements.

conclusion

The user goals were to collaboratively plan family reunions in ways that engage family members across generations from the early stages of the planning process all through post-event by uploading and sharing photos. By doing so, family traditions are cultivated, celebrated, and preserved.

Overall, we received positive feedback about their experience with the prototype and considered it easy to use.

usability testing analysis

site map

We created a site map to contextualize the findings from the usability tests and illustrate the areas of the kinnect platform where users encountered difficulties or navigated less efficiently.

lasting thoughts

Next Steps

If I had more time as UX Planning Lead, I would have loved to explore:

  • Supporting family tree building with memories uploaded to the platform

    • This further reinforces the core mission of kinkofa, bringing generations of Black families together and compliments an existing service of their organization: The African Diaspora Reunification Project. This project facilitates collecting autosomal DNA test results and creates a secured database for individuals looking to potentially reconnect with long-lost relatives.

  • Expanding on the event creation experience

  • Expanding features for attendees of the family reunion

For the future state of kinnect, it serves as a potential solution to onboard their target audience onto the broader kinkofa platform. We prioritized establishing virality for long-term engagement.

Having the opportunity to work with a client offered invaluable insight into a real working environment post-course and in the industry.

Transparency and clear communication from the beginning of the partnership should also be the expectation. This allows for all parties to receive constructive feedback when necessary.

Doing secondary research framed how I approached planning for this project. Being able to stand by my work and the mission of our client is nonnegotiable.

Next steps, I’d love to challenge myself with exploring the role of a design lead and how I would prioritize design tasks based on certain constraints.