File 03
2019
Folding 14 internal tools into one operations console
Sector
Fortune 500 logistics
Scale
~6,000 operators
Role
Senior Designer
Team
3 Design · 20 Eng
Duration
14 months
Client
30-second read
For hiring teams
Mapped 14 tools to the 6 jobs operators actually do, then designed for the jobs.
Built the company’s first design system to make consolidation possible.
New-hire training went from 2 weeks to 3 days.
This work is public, but internal data is still blurred out of respect for the operators.
Fig. 1 — Abstracted interface
Context
Operators switched between fourteen internal tools to move one shipment. Each tool had its own login, its own vocabulary, and its own idea of what a shipment was.
Constraints
—
Zero downtime: the warehouses run 24/7.
—
Tools were owned by six different engineering teams.
—
Operators were measured on speed, so any change had to be faster on day one.
Decisions
Decision
Rebuild the tools or reorganise around jobs?
Reskin all 14 tools
Rejected
Six job-based workspaces
Chosen
Operators think in jobs, not systems. Matching their mental model removed most of the switching.
Decision
Big-bang launch or gradual?
Big-bang launch
Rejected
One workspace at a time, per warehouse
Chosen
It let us retire tools as we went and kept every rollout small enough to roll back.
Outcome
9
Tools retired in the first year
3 days
New-hire training, down from 2 weeks
1
Design system, still in use
Reflection
The design system was the real product. I’d staff it as one from day one.