Lightweight GIS Editor: Project Aether
Award Winning SaaS for Gov’t in Energy & Electricity Sectors
Role
Lead Product Designer
Social Impact
Electrical Grid in Disaster Relief (Storm, flood and wildfires)
Team Structure
Clients, Principal Investigators, Project Managers, Software Engineers, GIS Data Scientists, Electrical Engineers, Chemists, and Environmentalists
Sponsors
National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC)
Puerto Rico Utility - LUMA Energy
National Transmission Project
Hanford Waste Management
Our Most-Used Standard Module - Visualization Editor
"I'd love for a tool somewhere… I wouldn't need to depend on Data Scientists for color style alterations... ArcGIS seems challenging to grasp..."
— Chemist @ PNNL
What's Project Aether?
Aether is a Software-as-a-service platform tailored for governmental entities, simplifying the data storage and distribution of Geospatial Information System (GIS) data to amplify cooperation and visual comprehension in intricate undertakings.
As the lead product designer, I helped launch a full-service offering, using design thinking to enable the product’s potential to attract and engage clients.
Future Concept - Table & Map Editing (designed by me)
"I want to empower the researchers to tweak minor details on maps and charts. ArcGIS appears to be too daunting for this purpose..."
— Data Scientist @ PNNL
What are our Objective and Key Results?
Objective — Develop an intuitive solution that empowers technical scientists to easily customize their maps and charts to meet their specific needs.
Key Result 1 — Reduce product onboarding time compare to ArcGIS
Key Result 2 — Apply solution to multiple technical domains
How did I lead the UX to get the Key Results?
Discover — Introduced the team with a human-centered approach to understand our end users and their pain points to define the core problem
Define — Developed user stories and success criteria aligned with our strategy
Design — Designed the core experience in Figma and collaborated with other designers to refine the details
Deliver — Created a streamlined, developer-centered handoff process for developers
Evaluate — Conducted field study to observe training workshops with industry scientists and end users to measure satisfaction and learnability
Discovery workshops to align engineers, PMs and SMEs on product vision and MVP features (led by me)
Discover — Empower Technical Scientists to Take Control of Their Data
Stakeholder Interviews – I created discussion guides and interview kits to explore the interactions and perspectives between chemists and data scientists.
End Users — Technical scientists who possess raw data and require the expertise of data scientists to transform it into actionable insights
Pain Points — Long wait times and heavy reliance on data scientists for minor adjustments, coupled with difficulties in effectively communicating the required changes.
Created user flows to align designers and engineers on a broad scope of work
Delegated tasks and guided the team toward the product vision using user stories
Define — Align and Priortize Features
User Flows – I created user flows to align the product vision and guided the team to prioritize efforts, focusing on the key user journey.
User Stories and Success Criteria – To facilitate task delegation and agile development, I worked with the design and engineering teams to iterate on an incomplete product handoff, shifting away from a waterfall approach.
Standardized experience (Artifacts provided by me)
Customized experience
Product Strategy — Craft Dual-Experience to Align with Client Needs
I led a series of quick and dirty product strategy workshops to refine our approach to client funding and product marketing.
Drawing on my product design expertise, I helped shape a dual-experience strategy:
A standardized experience that allows users to interact with and edit GIS data immediately
A customized experience where clients collaborate with our cross-functional team to build tailored data logic, formulas, and connections
How Aether Supports the Public Sectors
Standard Modules
We introduced uniform modules at a fixed contract cost, ensuring sponsors could access the service immediately without any delays.
Companion Apps
For dedicated data analysis, we provide customized modules as part of our extra service model in product design and development.
Standard Module - API Endpoint for Advanced Audiences
Customized App - Connect Sponsor's Data for Advanced Analysis
Approach
Strategy — Roadmaps & Vision alignment
Understand Context of Use — Whiteboard sessions with SMEs, sponsors and PMs
Define Requirements — Documented design brief, user stories and success criteria based on Statement of Work (SoW)
Design — Pen & Paper, Lo-fidelity, Mid-fidelity and Hi-Fidelity with annotations for the engineering team
Evaluate — Restricted usability testing & cross project team knowledge transferring
Files Standard Module - Enable Secure Data-Sharing for Maps and Other File Forms
Design Challenges
End User Access
Building Trust — Fostered collaboration with sponsors unfamiliar with UX by sharing our process.
Overcoming Barriers — Used secondary research (academic papers, Generative AI) to create user-centered designs without direct user access.
Streamline Engineer-Design Collaboration
Efficiency & Delivery — Met deadlines and budgets by creating a design system in Figma inspired by Material, Ant, and Atlassian Design, enabling engineers to deliver high-quality work independently.
Complex and Unfamiliar Application Design Space
Innovative Design — Tackled niche government app challenges by drawing insights from finance (data visualization) and project management (workflows) tools through cross-disciplinary research.
Example Annotation For Development - No Long In Use w. Design System Maturity
Design Leadership
Team Growth — Expanded team from 2 to 5, including seniors, juniors, and interns.
Systems & Processes — Established task tracking, design critiques, and reporting workflows in Figma and Confluence.
Team Support — Led weekly check-ins to balance workloads, enhance collaboration, and ensure quality.
Mentorship — Adapted leadership to individual strengths, fostering growth across all levels.
Referenced — Inspired by The Making of a Manager, Project Management for Humans, and my dad's leadership.
