WorkEase
Challenge
Office and contact‑centre workers spend long stretches seated at their computers, leading to high rates of neck, shoulder, and lower‑back pain that reduce comfort and work performance. Existing workplace activity programmes and sit‑stand desks often fail because they are hard to fit into real schedules and over‑promise vigorous exercise during work hours instead of realistic light‑intensity movement. The challenge was to design a desktop app that could break up sedentary time with tiny, acceptable posture changes and walks, without disrupting core tasks or KPIs.
User & Insights
The primary users are mid‑career office and contact‑centre workers like Sarah, a monitored call‑centre agent with neck/shoulder pain and anxiety about looking like she’s slacking, and Ted, a university administrator with chronic low‑back pain who often forgets to move once immersed in desk work. Research and profiling showed they are motivated by pain relief, comfort, and energy but constrained by time pressure, performance metrics, and social visibility at the desk. Key insights were that micro‑breaks must be short (30–120 seconds), subtle, and clearly endorsed by the organisation, with non‑judgemental language and visible links between movement, pain trends, and work goals.
Design Process
Research
Reviewed literature on musculoskeletal pain, sedentary behaviour, and workplace activity interventions to understand realistic behaviour change at work. Defined a detailed user profile capturing age range, roles, organisation ethos, constraints, and motivational factors.
Personas & scenarios
Created two evidence‑based personas: Sarah (monitored call‑centre agent) and Ted (university administrator) with distinct pain patterns and work contexts. Wrote task scenarios for “guided micro‑breaks between calls” and “setting up a daily movement plan,” anchoring the flows in real work days.
Task & Conceptual Modelling
Built a combined task model showing how users log in, configure plans, receive prompts, act (stand, walk, stretch), and log discomfort on a 0–10 scale. Defined a conceptual model with core objects (User, DailyPlan, MicroBreakSettings, Prompts, MovementEvents, SummaryView, FeedbackView) and their relationships.
Wire-framing & Prototyping
Sketched low‑fidelity flows for onboarding, configuration, notification prompts, workout, and insights to iterate quickly on layout and copy. Developed high‑fidelity macOS‑style screens adopting Apple’s Tahoe language to reduce learning effort for office workers.
Usability‑driven Refinement
Specified quantitative usability targets (learnability, speed, accuracy, memorability, satisfaction) before polishing visuals. Ran a heuristic evaluation and adjusted states, error prevention, and control affordances (e.g., clearer disabled sections, time pickers, confirmations) based on findings.
Usability
Usability requirements were defined upfront using Shneiderman’s attributes and ISO 9241‑11, with measurable targets for learnability, efficiency, accuracy, memorability, and satisfaction. Goals included: 80% of new users configuring a plan within 120 seconds without help, median prompt‑response times under 5 seconds, configuration error rates ≤ 5%, unintended prompt actions < 2%, and at least 80% of users agreeing prompts are helpful and not too intrusive. A heuristic evaluation of the prototype against Nielsen’s heuristics highlighted issues such as unclear disabled states and destructive actions without confirmation, which informed refinements to visibility of system status, error prevention, and control over notifications.
Prototype
I've translated the flows and models into a high‑fidelity desktop prototype that follows the macOS Tahoe design language so it feels familiar in office environments. The prototype covers end‑to‑end journeys including onboarding, configuring daily plans and micro‑breaks, handling subtle notifications, completing guided exercises with camera feedback, and reviewing pain trends on the insights dashboard.