- Author: Kit Alviz
User testing for Project Board between September 2017 and February 2018 included a private session with the Project Board Academic Advisory Committee, three open sessions inviting all academics with ANR merit and promotion processes and CE Specialists with campus merit and promotion processes, and a private “soft launch” with a handful of CE Advisors. Participants included 21 CE advisors, 14 CE Specialists, three Dean's office staff, and seven other academic titles.
The input was extremely value for improving the system and ensuring a smooth user experience. Several participants indicated that this system is intuitive, friendly, and an improvement from DANRIS-X. Some input was incorporated immediately for review on the next user testing session, while other items required more exploration into policies.
Highlights of significant changes as a result of user testing input:
- Activity forms went through several improvements. University/Public Service and Professional Competence were separated from the other activity types. User experience was improved for specific activity data fields such as theme/project links, tags, and collaborators. The forms will be wider and will close upon saving.
- Civil Rights Compliance descriptive statistics were revised to indicate a new status of “no activities entered yet,” in addition to the parity/compliance statuses.
- Clientele Groups imported from CASA now appear correctly in CE Advisors' accounts.
- Mousefree usage continues to be improved and a guide is being compiled on this help page: http://ucanr.edu/sites/ProjectBoardHelp/Get_Started/#mousefree
- Specific instructions for Statewide Programs with existing reporting systems will be created so reduce duplicative data entry efforts between those systems and Project Board.
The development teams continue to meet weekly and biweekly to confirm policies and procedures, system improvements, and develop training plans.