Reimagining Workflow Effectiveness in Government Content Management
TEAM
1 Product Designer(Me), 1 Business Owner, 2 Engineers
TIMELINE
5 Weeks, 2024
Project Type
North Star
Summary
Mid-sized government teams using CMS faced delays in content approval and publishing due to inefficient workflows. To address this, I designed role-specific portals (Requester, Designer, QA) with task tracking and mandatory previews to improve transparency and efficiency. Our goal: reduce approval delays by 70% and increase efficiency by 40%.
Context
Citysite is a no-code CMS for small local governments, helping small teams manage websites efficiently.
Business Needs
To scale profitably, Citysite must expand its user base to include mid-sized government teams.
Goal
Enable mid-sized government teams to efficiently create, update, and manage web pages.
Challenge
How might we enable mid-sized government teams to efficiently create and manage websites?
Research
I conducted one-on-one online interviews with three employees from a mid-sized local government and identified three key personas within the team:
Key Pain Points
đ¨ Difficult to manage and follow up on email feedback.
âManaging and keeping track of email feedback is a nightmare. Over 30% of our time gets wasted just trying to reconcile comments across endless email threads.â
âł Hard to track tickets and ensure timely publishing.
âTracking tickets and making sure things get published on time is a real challenge. Some approvals can take up to 4 weeks simply because thereâs no clear visibility.â
đ Limited granular access control.
âOur current CMS platforms use broad role-based access control, which makes it hard to give access to only specific pages or projects. This creates accidental edits, inefficiencies, and security risks.â
Problem to Solve
Mid-sized government teams need a streamlined system to overcome slow approvals and inefficient website management.
Ideate
I led a workshop to evaluate technical and business constraints and define a North Star design for the fundraising experience.
The engineering team noted that Twillâs limitations restricted new feature development in the current Citysuite CMS. With fundraising and a custom CMS in mind, we aligned on framing these features as a future-state vision to guide development and support the investor narrative.
Hypothesis
A role-specific content management workflow can improve efficiency for mid-sized government teams.
Requester Portal
Requesters struggled with visibilityâstatus updates were buried in emails, and chasing progress meant endless meetings.
A smart dashboard that provides real-time tracking, highlights stalled requests, and enables instant notifications.
Designer Portal
Designers had full access to everything, leading to accidental edits and security risks.
Self-assign tasks and gain instant access to the relevant pages, ensuring both control and security.
Feedback was scattered across multiple channels, making revisions chaotic.
Rejection reasons are pinned at the top, with easy access to threaded comments from QA and requestersâeliminating lost feedback.
QA Specialist Portal
QA specialists were approving content without seeing the final version, leading to mistakes.
A mandatory preview step now ensures every piece is reviewed before publishing.
Test & Iterate
The business owner wanted high-fidelity designs quickly for fundraising and was hesitant about usability testing due to time and cost. I reframed usability testing as a way to strengthen his pitch with real user feedback, potentially boosting design impact and investor confidence. We tested mid-fidelity prototypes with three users over two days.
Finding 1
âJust showing numbers isnât enoughâI need to know what those requests are.â
đ Solution: Tasks are filtered by these categories, rather than being listed numerically.
Finding 2
âAll files are importantâif I donât see them all, I might forget or miss something.â
đ Solution: Files are always visible or expandable to avoid missing details.
Finding 3
âItâs too easy to publish before a proper review!â
đ Solution: Added mandatory preview before approval.
Design & Implementation
Enhancing Visibility, Prioritization, and Accountability
Since this task-heavy dashboard is highly condensed, I used color-coded status tags to highlight priorities, ensuring urgent tasks stand out. Priority-based sorting and inactivity alerts further streamline workflow, helping users focus on critical work and prevent delaysâboosting efficiency and collaboration. đ
Visual Consistency & Predictability
The Request Detail Page maintains a consistent layout across all portals, reducing cognitive load and enabling intuitive navigation. A unified design helps users develop muscle memory, improving efficiency and minimizing errors.
Emphasizing Error States & Guided Corrections
To streamline error handling, rejected requests require QA to provide clear reasons and revision suggestions, highlighted in a red box at the top. This ensures designers can quickly identify issues, reducing back-and-forth communication and accelerating revisionsâultimately enhancing workflow efficiency and user experience.
Reflections
Success Metrics Upon Launch
Although this is a North Star design, if implemented, we would track:
Approval Delays
đ Â Goal: Reduce delays by 70%
Tracked by measuring time from request submission to final approval.
Task Completion Efficiency
đ Goal: Increase task completion by 40%
Tracked by measuring weekly task completion rates pre/post-implementation.
Lessons Learned
đ Mapping Multi-Persona Workflows is Key
Government workflows are complex. Tailoring portals by role ensures clarity without sacrificing compliance.
âď¸ Balancing Consistency & Customization
Core UI must remain intuitive while accommodating unique role needs.
Next Steps: Driving Adoption
To ensure government teams embrace the new CMS, I will:
đ˘ Involve stakeholders early â Secure buy-in through workshops.
đ Pilot Testing â Test with a mid-sized team before full rollout.
đŻ Change Management Strategy â Provide onboarding resources to ease the transition.
Contents