Atos is a France-based IT consulting firm with 220,000 employees worldwide. It announced the plan to first reopen offices in Europe by Fall 2020 and then the entire global locations by the end of 2021.  

Although full vaccination was required to enter the office, risks of having people back still existed. Also, there were a lot of things to consider to have people work onsite. For instance, how will social distancing be enforced? What can be done to make sure everyone stays safe and healthy?

How can we create a safe work environment that ensures social distancing? What should be done to simplify the office reopening process?

To simplify the complex process of returning to office, my team created Atos Safe Office that focused on employee safety and peace-of-mind through clear communication, easy-to-use booking management, and safe operations control.

The service was first launched in August 2020 and aimed for global implementation across +200 offices worldwide.

Design Preview

Here are the highlights of the final solution that my team delivered.

Plan and Go
Plan commute in advance to maintain social distancing within office and abide by local safety guidelines

Stay Informed
‍Easy-to-digest, simple, official documentation around safety protocols, available PPE materials, and how-to-guides

Local Community
Conversational chat to ensure direct communication among all checked-in employees (per site and specific day) for support and easy communication

Understanding Target Users

Before diving into the actual design stage, I needed to know what users wanted. I also wanted to understand their psychology prior to returning to office (i.e. are they excited? scared? what makes them feel in such ways?)

I conducted in-depth qualitative interviews with 10 people. At this stage, it was imperative that I uncovered a range of user insights from both older and younger employees, from those who were single to those who lived with other family members, and those had already started going to the office and who had not.

The goal was to uncover the needs of the target users to help brainstorm appropriate and impactful solutions. I compiled all these interviews and created a few personas to help guide my design decisions.

In total, I created 3 user persona, which varied by age and marriage status. While each persona had its own unique goals and needs, they shared common pain points, goals, and needs, which I must pay attention to as a ux designer.

The key insights I learned through comparing and contrasting each persona were:

Worried about returning to office
For those who were still working from home (mainly in the US), they were more worried than excited about returning to office. They believed it was better to just work from home than taking the risks when there still was a chance of catching the virus from their commute or in the office.

High demand for safety education
For those who started going back to the office (some employees in Spain returned onsite as of September), they were not as concerned about returning to office. Rather, they were more curious about practical measures, such as learning safety measures relevant for different office space (i.e. canteen, meeting rooms, reception area, etc), staying safe during commute, and maintaining social distance with colleagues in the office, etc).

Concerned about getting other people sick
Regardless of regions, those who were married or lived with other family members were more worried. They were concerned about getting their family members sick.

Brainstorming User Flow

With the tactical goals of the users defined, it was time to map out the user flow to identify each step that must be completed to ensure safe, covid-free environment. Having a visualization of the user experience helped define key touchpoints, such as QR codes, and features, such as meeting room reservation, that should be included in the solution.

Brainstorming Design

Since my team was building this solution from scratch, I explored a variety of design treatments to find opportunities to make reserving work space easier. Based on the user flow, I started producing lofi wireframes and eventually elevated them to hifi prototypes that I could test on users.

The goal was to test and iterate fast. Countless changes and adjustments took me through countless prototypes that each built on one another making for a more clear and seamless experience.

Exploring Design Treatments

After loops of feedback and weekly design critiques from Design, Engineering and Business teams, I learned that design treatments that were native iOS Design would drive greater efficiency and create more coherent experience for users.

My team also worked closely with the Copy team and subject matter experts (SME) on public health to shape and polish the product experience. The Copy team played a significant role by crafting clear, friendly copy that helps users achieve a goal and understand the value of queueing. SMEs shared their insights for developing educational content related to office safety and public hygiene.

We continued to collaborate with teams for feedback. Validating our design solutions through user testing helped us feel confident about our design decisions.

Once final design was ready, I created the design handover doc for engineers. In this doc, I explained the user flow, core component and design specs to help engineers easily understand the feature they were developing. This way, our team was able to work efficiently and reduce unnecessary back-and-forth communications.

Final Solution

After weeks of development, here is the final design of the Atos Safe Office mobile application.

Key Features and Highlights

Here are the highlights of the final solution that my team delivered.

Health Checkups
‍Users must complete the self-declaration form, which asks for recent health condition, travel history, and potential exposure to virus in the past 14 days.

Team Collaboration
‍When users reserve their office space, they can also invite colleagues for collaboration. This way, users can easily arrange group meeting or discussion if they need to.

Help request
If users need help, they can reach out to on-site support team for help. Requests can range from lunch pickup to hygiene product refill if the supply runs out. This way, users can avoid unnecessary travels and minimize contact with others.