Goal
How might we create a positive experience for Stanford donors that fits their mental model, puts financial information at their fingertips, clarifies positive impact, and ultimately increases donor propensity for repeated giving?
Solution
Giving History intranet portal
Role
UI/UX and visual designer
Summary
In redesigning Stanford University's Giving History portal (a comprehensive, self-service donation management platform), we wanted to make it easy for donors to track, manage, and gain insights from their philanthropic history and increase personalization in order to increase donor propensity and make strategic decisions about future philanthropic investments.
In my role as user experience designer for this project, my responsibilities included increasing approachability to financial and philanthropic concepts, redesigning information architecture and user flows, and defining an appropriate visual language that was simultaneously distinct and in keeping with the overall ecosystem's design system.
This design work was completed in collaboration with Kerri Augenstein, Senior Stanford Web Services UI/UX designer and lead creative.
NOTABLE MOMENTS
Systems thinking for complex variable interactions: Given the multifaceted nature of philanthropic data, our team conducted comprehensive scenario mapping to account for all variable combinations affecting the user experience. We needed to consider how individual versus household giving, privacy permissions across different users, applied filters and views, corporate matching programs, memorial/honor gifts, and gifts given by foundations or companies on behalf of others would each create distinct interface requirements. We systematically analyzed how each variable combination would cascade across all page elements, ensuring design consistency and data accuracy across every possible user scenario.
Navigating constraints strategically and user-centered problem-solving: We explored ways to maximize user value within technical and policy constraints through the discovery of data architecture and university privacy policy limitations. Rather than accepting these constraints as boundaries, our team leveraged creative problem-solving to identify alternative approaches that could deliver meaningful user insights within the identified technical parameters. This strategic approach allowed us to advocate for user needs while proposing practical solutions that satisfied business requirements and compliance standards.
Unrealized value proposition
Despite containing valuable data, the web app had unrealized value in that it didn't make connections and extract meaningful conclusions from data that would be useful to users. This was evident through information fragmentation that separated related data across multiple pages, and raw data presentation that lacked interpretive tools or contextual insights.
Overwhelming with limited controls
Users were inundated with raw data and lacked the filters, facets, sorts, and views needed to make sense of the information. The web app's information architecture was informed by the way data was internally organized, causing user confusion around design decisions (i.e. the difference between "Gifts" and "Other Gifts"). One of the challenges in redesigning the portal included navigating around this structural data constraint while prioritizing user needs.
Fragmented information and weak information architecture
The information architecture caused user confusion around design decisions (i.e. the difference between "Gifts" and "Other Gifts") and left users to try to understand how the data was organized across pages. Related information (i.e. Pledge summary, details, and "other pledges") was spread across multiple pages, costing users time and effort to piece together data and insights.
Intuitive information architecture
To address the pain points around information overload and feeling overwhelmed, we implemented a progressive disclosure strategy. At each step of a user's flow, they are presented with only as much information as needed to differentiate gifts and to ascertain if that is the contribution they would like to delve further into.
Approachable data with powerful controls
In addition to implementing a strategic disclosure of data, we addressed issues around information overload and data fatigue by implementing various views and filters informed by user needs. Tabs to quickly jump between different views, toggles to swap between Individual and Household gifts, and filters for gifts made in a specific calendar year or fiscal year empowered users to manipulate tables to find the data they wanted and draw insights efficiently. We also implemented column sorts and a rows per page selector to meet user expectations.
