Since its implementation in 2016, Volunteer Centre Hackney (VCH), a charity based in London, had faced years of challenges with their third-party volunteer engagement digital platform, Simply Connect. Ongoing issues, which had never been fully resolved, left the charity with a persistent awareness and worry that the platform — and, by extension, the charity — might not be performing to its full potential.
With an opportunity to secure additional funding presenting itself that would provide the resources for VCH to explore options on how to finally address this longstanding issue, they felt it was the right time to act.
My role was therefore to support the charity’s funding application by not only identifying the long-suspected usability issues present in the platform, and articulating their impact on the user experience, but also communicating how they may be affecting VCH’s mission to enable as many people living and working in Hackney to engage with volunteering.
What are the usability issues and shortcomings within Simply Connects volunteer engagement platform that impact the user experience for VCH’s diverse user groups?
Additionally, how can these issues be effectively addressed, with a consideration of alternative solutions, to enhance user engagement and, ultimately, community involvement in volunteering activities?
Simply Connect functions as a digital platform for volunteer engagement, facilitating connections, or in its own words ‘matches’, between individuals and local charitable organisations. Amongst its key features are:
I conducted separate stakeholder meetings with the Deputy CEO, Head of Volunteering, and Volunteer Coordinator, each of whom provided valuable feedback on the project's rationale, objectives, and the issues they were aware of. The meetings also helped identify two unique user groups whose experiences would need to be reflected in my findings:
The high-level descriptions provided by interviewees regarding the characteristics of the two user groups made complete sense, yet their responses to my questions about the more specific characteristics of the volunteer user group were quite vague.
Given the multiple entry points into their service, many of which are offline, I understood the difficulty VCH staff members may have had in distinguishing the group of 'service' users who engage online via Simply Connect.
I felt it would therefore be beneficial to spend time analysing the available data to gain clarity on how closely actual users aligned with the descriptions provided in the interviews.
My hope was that access to a web analytics tool would be possible in this phase of the project, not only for identifying user demographics but also for uncovering user metrics — such as engagement patterns, user behaviour, drop-off rates, and conversion rates — which could help provide early indications of where issues may exist.
Unfortunately access to such tools was not available as they were not installed on the site. However, all was not lost as access to the integrated Simply Connect CRM database was provided, initially helping to clarify particular characteristics of the volunteer user group:
Identifying demographic information about the volunteer user group I'm sure would prove valuable when navigating the later stages of the project. That said, it was the analysis of user behaviour that in fact proved to be most revealing in this phase, as it highlighted patterns in the data that raised initial concerns about the platform's effectiveness and indicated that all was not right...
The high percentage of users who had applied for roles, been accepted, but had not been ‘placed’ seemed particularly alarming, especially since stakeholders had emphasised the constant need for volunteers from their partner organisations. While various external factors could influence this trend — such as changes in circumstances or a loss of interest — I was particularly keen to explore whether any usability issues might also be contributing to it.
The user experience evaluation consisted of two phases:
I used Jakob Nielsen's 10 usability heuristics as a starting point but also included a broader framework of assessment criteria to evaluate key usability factors such as:
In total, over 270 instances of issues were identified, many of which could serve as supporting evidence to explain why particular patterns were presenting themselves in the statistical outcomes uncovered in the data analysis. Among the most critical issues identified were:
After organising the issues and assigning severity ratings, I shared my findings, along with a series of preliminary recommendations, with VCH. The goal at this point was to give VCH an early understanding of the scope and complexity of the issues identified, as well as a framework for discussion should they wish to initiate conversations with Simply Connect about addressing the design flaws.
With knowledge from the outset of the project that VCH was uncertain about their long-term use of Simply Connect, I also highlighted several ‘quick wins’ among the recommendations — high-priority, low-complexity fixes that could be easily and immediately implemented to enhance the user experience and provide short-term support before VCH considered their next steps.
The evidence collected so far, and its sheer volume, certainly suggested VCH had a strong case to put forward for further funding, with the data and findings all pointing towards an underperforming platform in need of urgent attention. Yet, what could further strengthen this argument were the voices of the VCH user groups, and their ability to communicate just how these usability issues were impacting the user experience. In order to capture this type of feedback, I opted for usability testing.
In total, 15 test participants (10 volunteer users and 5 organisation users) were recruited for moderated test sessions, with the recruitment of individuals being managed by VCH and guided by the user characteristics identified in the earlier phases of the project.
The sessions themselves proved incredibly valuable and left me with a large volume of data to organise and analyse. To help manage this process, I decided to use Dovetail, beginning with tagging noteworthy quotes and observations before using affinity mapping to arrange the data into themes and patterns.
In completing this stage of the analysis, I was able to validate a number of findings previously identified in the usability evaluation. For volunteer users, the search experience emerged as the aspect of the journey that caused the most confusion and frustration. On the other hand, for organisation users, a lack of clarity during seemingly straightforward tasks, as well as technical issues present in the platform, proved to be particularly disruptive to their workflows.
Yet perhaps of more importance was the deeper understanding gained regarding the impact these issues had on the user experience, with the analysis of the confusion, frustration, and disappointment regularly expressed by users uncovering insights into why particular issues arose.
And not all of these insights stemmed from complex issues; some were seemingly minor, yet their impacts significant...
Reaching this point in the project it was clear that the two user groups were finding it far from ‘simple’ to connect with one another; in reality, the situation was much closer to the opposite, with numerous usability obstacles complicating the processes that should facilitate the two user groups coming together.
Considering the risks this posed to VCH's mission of engaging as many individuals as possible in volunteering in Hackney, they were right to ask the critical question: if not Simply Connect, then who?
VCH provided me with details of five alternative volunteer engagement platforms to review. Due to the ethical considerations involved in creating fictitious organisations, it was agreed that I would focus solely on assessing the volunteer portals of each platform.
Prior to beginning the analysis, I revisited the data collected from the usability test sessions to compile a list of user preferences to incorporate into the assessment criteria, with the assessment itself to follow the same broader framework used when analysing Simply Connect.
What became abundantly clear after completing this phase of the project was that the volunteer engagement solution market lacked a stand-out option, as even the more promising solutions posed significant usability challenges for users, especially concerning the search experience, arguably the most essential feature.
However, there was evident potential in two particular solutions that, with targeted modifications rather than complete overhauls, could better align with the expectations and preferences of VCH users.
I shared my analysis and recommendations with VCH to discuss internally and prepared to draw my final conclusions.
It was clear from the research findings that Simply Connect fell well short of providing a functional and rewarding user experience, with the platform failing to effectively deliver on its promise to 'make it quick and easy for organisations to find suitable matches, and individuals to find the right role for them.' Added to this the major issues the platform created for VCH in accurately tracking 'placed' volunteers, the recommendation of switching to a new provider feel like a logical suggestion.
However, the competitor analysis had not produced a conclusive frontrunner, and the two providers put forward as potential solutions to explore further would also need adaptations to their designs in order to align with the preferences of VCH users. It was therefore in this context that I decided to frame my final recommendations within the summary report as ‘building blocks for a better platform’.
These recommendations would highlight to VCH, and a potential future provider, some of the key tasks, features, and considerations that should be prioritised to ensure that the newly adopted platform aligns with the expectations of VCH users and supports the organisation's aim of getting as many people into volunteering in Hackney as possible.
The final report has been submitted to VCH, with their team now working on writing the main funding application. I am hopeful that a positive update can be posted on this page soon...
In the meantime VCH are continuing to work with Simply Connect on addressing the ‘quick wins’ and have held discussions with the Simply Connect support team about how to address the more complex issues identified.
VCH expressed their gratitude for the evidence provided, which helped them understand the issues their users were facing, their impact, and equipped them with the knowledge and tangible artifacts needed to aid the decision-making process when considering their digital online solution.
I found real value in conducting data analysis before evaluating the interface, and although there were some initial challenges in cleaning the raw data, once this was completed, it helped provide early focus and helped shape tasks later in the project. More importantly however, it produced tangible outputs that clarified some of the usability issues uncovered during the evaluation and usability testing, as well as their impact.
I also feel that after having worked on this project, where users were presented with such a high volume of usability issues, and listening to the impact these had on the user experience, my appreciation of a functional design approach has grown stronger. Functionality, usability, simplicity, and ease of use are crucial elements of the user experience, and when these principles are overlooked or undervalued, the user experience can truly suffer, as this project clearly highlighted.
