How our design partnership unified 11 legacy systems into a single, effective platform for our client.
Client details are private under an NDA.
Duration: 9 Months
Team Structure: Vendor design/PM team integrated with the client's
in-house engineering team.
Strategy & Vision
Team Integration
Executive Communication
The nation's top barge operator faced a critical challenge: a fragmented ecosystem of 11 outdated systems. This forced their teams to manage logistics with emails and spreadsheets, creating inefficiency and significant safety risks. The initial plan was a simple technical integration, but it was clear this would fail because the systems were fundamentally failing the people.
As the design and product partner, our team presented a new business case, resulting in a strategic pivot to first understand the crews' real-world needs. This decision was the project's turning point, leading to a 35% gain in efficiency.
The project began with a flawed technical plan. I presented a formal risk analysis to convince stakeholders to shift from a technology-first approach to a research-first strategy, securing the mandate for deep discovery.
The vessel crews were skeptical after three previous modernization failures. Our leadership team led the initial fieldwork personally, promising to fix their top three problems. This turned skepticism into a true partnership.
Our research into 11 distinct roles produced complex data. The breakthrough was identifying the Linehaul Captain as the primary persona. Solving for their core needs first created a ripple effect of clarity for all other roles.
We established a single, cohesive team culture between our designers and the client's engineers. This partnership allowed us to deliver a unified platform that reflected the crews' real-world needs, including crucial offline capability.
This project presented two defining challenges that required direct leadership.
The crews were deeply skeptical after three previous modernization projects had failed. An operator named Marcus put it bluntly:
"IT comes here, takes notes, and nothing ever changes."
To rebuild trust, our project leadership led the initial fieldwork personally, spending time on both day and night shifts. A simple promise was made: "We can't fix everything. But the top three problems you all mentioned? We will fix those." This commitment created the foundation for a true partnership.
Leadership viewed the proposed user research as an unbudgeted delay. To gain support, a formal risk analysis was presented, highlighting the company's financial loss on a similar past project. The data shifted the conversation from cost to risk, and the research was approved.
The core challenge was to design a single "Fleet Picture", a real-time operational view, for 11 distinct roles. Our research identified the Linehaul Captain as the primary persona. By solving for their needs first, we could create a ripple effect of clarity for all other roles.
| Role | Core Job (JTBD) | Key Platform Workflow |
|---|---|---|
| Linehaul Captain (Primary) | Build, verify the tow composition, and ensure optimal build for safe transit. | Check barge characteristics, monitor build progress, and confirm tow readiness to ensure operational efficiency and safety. |
| Dispatch Operator | Keep an accurate, real-time fleet state. | Create and update initial tow builds in under 15 minutes. |
| Coordinator Tug Captain | Plan shifts and deconflict service crews. | Create "what-if" fleets without altering live data. |
| Billing Manager | Invoice accurately for all billable events. | Export all billable events, eliminating manual reconciliation. |
| Repair Technician | Verify access windows before dispatching a crew. | Find a target barge and confirm service windows to reduce failed attempts. |
The project's success was driven by the close collaboration between our vendor team and the client's engineers.
Our primary role was to lead design, research, and product management, acting as a seamless extension of the client's internal engineering team. Success required building a single, cohesive culture focused on shared goals, not organizational charts.
The project’s focus was shifted from a technical goal to a human one. A weekly leadership meeting with leads from our team and the client's engineering department ensured alignment and facilitated tough trade-off decisions.
To ensure the platform was robust, several key governance decisions were made. Role-based write-access was carefully managed to ensure data integrity, and vessel crews were given offline capability to reflect the reality of their work environment.
The integrated team delivered a unified platform that solved the crew's most significant challenges.
The project's lasting impact, however, was the change it created within the organization. The human-centered process was so successful that it was adopted as the new company-wide standard. A simple playbook and workshops were developed to train their internal teams.
The project didn't just deliver a product; it delivered a new, more effective way of working.
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