Coordi Co-Parenting
Designed to create consistency in your children's lives while living between two houses, with an emphasis on well being for the whole family.
DURATION
10 weeks
KEY SKILLS
Ideation, Interviews, User Stories, Journey Maps, Sketching, Information Architecture, Workflows, Wireframing, Visual Design
MOTIVATION
Growing up, well over half of my closest friends had divorced or separated parents.
Almost 50% of all marriages in the United States will end in divorce or separation.
Context
01 - PROBLEM
Constant, direct communication between separated parents causes stress, arguments, and tension for the entire family.
Distrust and lack of communication between parents is proven to have negative and long-lasting effects on children living in the same household.
02 - BRIEF
Coordi is a collaborative application for parents living in separate households that allows engagement within a safe, neutral space to enhance communication, productivity, sense of independence, and emotional well-being.
Taking place in an accessible and convenient platform for parental essentials such as scheduling, planning, sharing, and negotiation.
03 - TARGET
Coordi was designed around co-parents living in a separate households but raising their children together. Coordi puts differences aside and focuses on the one important thing both parents share: their children.
04 - SOLUTION OVERVIEW
Main Features
Main Features
Newsfeed
Have easy access and share in all special moments your kids are having.
Keep your co-parent updated about anything in a safe and neutral space.
Co-Calendar
Compare and contrast your own busy schedule to your children’s busy schedules.
Coordinate for pick-up and drop-off by clearly sharing those responsibilities to make sure your kids are always where they are supposed to be.
Corkboard
Set reminders for your kids to take prescriptions, share lists, form habits, weaken the divide. It’s like writing on the board on your kitchen wall.
Checkbook
Send and receive funds relevant to co-parenting your children. Quickly split large school payments or help out with specific bills. Attach a receipt for both co-parent’s records.
Research
05 - INTERVIEWS
Three interviews were conducted with divorced and separated parents at different stages of life, and additionally a daughter raised between two households.
Financial Stress
Even children realize financial stress is one of the leading causes of separation and divorce
Childhood Trauma
Younger children tend to be more confused by divorce, and older children tend to react angrily
Children First
Both parents expressed their desires to attend to the needs and wants before their own
Identity Development
Parents also expressed their desires to develop their self-identities as single adults
Lack of Clarity
All interviewees agreed that coordination is difficult, and misunderstanding causes tension and stress
Adaptation
Adjusting to a significant change in lifestyle is a difficult process on top of the emotional toll
06 - THE GOALS
Neutrality
Creat a neutral and safe space that protects the vulnerability of single parents
Well-Being
Design for the well-being of other family members to minimize stress for everyone
Convenience
Streamline access to ensure continuous and engaged usage to enhance product success
Aesthetics
Create an accessible application that users of any generation can navigate
Communication
Allow effective and transparent communication for complete clarity and ease of tension
Unity
Create common ground and unity between differences for the betterment of everyone's health
07 - USER PERSONAS
The Proactive Mother
Wants a way negotiate carpooling for her kid’s extracurricular activities even on unactive days
The Disheartened Father
Wants a shared and customizable platform for the organization of his kid’s lives
The Disorganized Mother
Wants trackable way to transfer money to her co-parent in order to manage her kid’s finances
08 - JOURNEY MAP
I put myself in Sandra's shoes and stopped at every point in her journey to understand her needs, fears, and wants to identify potential opportunities for every moment.
Experience
09 - ARCHITECTURE
At this point, I had 1001 ideas. It was time to narrow it down and identify what features should exist that aligned with my goals and the user's main needs.
10 - USER FLOW
These high-level structures highlight critical user flows of the application and break down processes the user would use to achieve specific tasks.
IDEATE > ITERATE > COMMUNICATE
Throughout the process I filled pages with sketches, mind-maps, notes, ideas, and iterations of flows.
11 - SKETCH
Sketching first allowed me to gain an intimate insight on what layouts will work before getting digital with it.
12 - WIREFRAME
Creating detailed wireframes helped make navigation seamless and straightforward.
Each main user flow is represented and an onboarding process for app integration began to be developed.
Interface
13 - MOODBOARD A
The moodboards are focused around two characters from Pixar's Finding Nemo with the same goal of searching for and saving Nemo but who went about it in two very different ways. The first was influenced by Dory.
14 - APPLIED STYLE A
In creating the first visual style, I created visual aspects based on Dory's exciteable and optimistic personality. The result was a colorful, free flowing visual take.
I learned a lot about using a light source in my UI and creating layers to distinguish between elements in an interface with this iteration. However, after testing and critique, I was able to target more specific pain points that lacked clarity and held the potential to confuse the user.
15 - MOODBOARD B
For the second visual style, the moodboard was based off of Finding Nemo's Marlin. More rigid, stern, and structured, I analyzed Marlin's personality and used it to develop a new UI.
16 - APPLIED STYLE B
Marlin's style is less playful and more structured. Marlin is also a more detail-oriented character, more worrysome and focused. For his style, I not only changed the visual look but also enhanced small details to make components of the application clearer.
I ultimately leaned towards the second iteration as the final style due to the fact that it has greater accessibility and higher levels of clarity. It allows the user to see more information at a quick glance and highlighted crucial information more heavily.
17 - SOLUTION
Final Visual Design
Based on my learnings from the previous visual iterations, the strongest components of both were used to create a visual design that best reflects the needs of the parents.
Conclusion
18 - ACCESSIBILITY
In the first iteration of the visual style, it relied heavily in color for the sake of aesthetics. The second iteration allowed more focus on information design without depending as much on color.
If I were to continue on this project, I would love to delve into a deeper understanding of color accessibility and the way it effects the users, and potentially design an accessibility-focused iteration so no user is left unable to use Coordi.
19 - CORE NEED
Throughout the process, I wanted to maintain a focus on the children involved while also considering the well-being of not only the children, but also the parents.
I would love to develop ways of fostering self care without straying too far from the core goal.
Thank you 
