My Role: UX research, design, writing and strategy

YourPath Health provides technology supported resources to people struggling with substance use issues and I created a design strategy for them as they continue to grow their business. Their philosophy is that no matter the condition, the client gets to choose their own path. My mission was to create a design strategy that encapsulates what they stand for— to trust and to be trusted.

I chose to work with YourPath Health because they are doing such good work in the recovery community. They are a start up in the second round of funding and everyone at the company is performing a vital role. I wanted to present to them a plan that would be immediately impactful with deliverables that are low-lift for implementation.

This is where UX comes in

I worked closely with stakeholders to develop a plan that can be implemented in the short term and that would ensure each touchpoint is saturated with their values. The experience I designed is one that will inspire trust internally, in clients and in partner organizations.

Methods: Comparative Analysis | Stakeholder Interviews | User Flows | Journey Mapping | Secondary Research | Decision Matrix | Relationship Diagramming | Surveying | Personas

Deliverables: Strategy plan to develop core values, enhance outreach efforts and create a digital marketing presence.

Tools: Figma/Figjam | Google Suite | Miro | Zoom | Teams | Adobe Illustrator | Adobe Photoshop

PROJECT OVERVIEW

Problem

The problems I identified come down to identity, awareness and visibility. YourPath knows who they are but have yet to dictate what that looks like to their clients and partners as a whole. Without a solid identity, spreading the word about what they do is only partly effective and without an identity, it is difficult to know what you are looking at.

Solution

Developing core values is low budget, relatively low effort and high impact. It is where to start so that all other touch-points gain the benefit of these established values. YourPath’s values should be demonstrated through outreach to clients and partners specifically, through print media. A social media plan is a good idea for YourPath because the only way they are currently spreading awareness is through word of mouth which will not allow them to meet their goal of becoming a nationally recognized company in the span of three years.

CONCEPT DEVELOPMENT

Phase: Identify, Prototype

I interviewed three YourPath Stakeholders and one director of programming from a partner organization. I did a comparative analysis of organizations that provide similar services and started prototyping with user flows and relationship diagrams.

User flow

This diagram shows how the client interacts with YourPath when using their services.

Relationship Diagram

This diagram shows how YourPath relates to partner organizations, the recovery industry and healthcare as a whole.

Insights

The time it takes for this flow to complete is short. Sometimes as short as a few minutes up to a few hours which means there is little time to build trust. Additionally, the client interacts with multiple people so it is important that YourPath has a consistent response to clients.

Insights

  • Clients most frequently learn about YourPath via other organizations.

  • YourPath gets most of their client base through other organizations rather than via web searches.

  • YourPath doesn’t have the people power to scale outreach because only one person can do it.

From stakeholder interviews and deep dive research, I created personas that informed a future state journey map. At this point I isolated the designed experience I wanted to create-- trust.

Phase: Early Prototyping

Insight

  • The population that YourPath serves is mostly unhoused, involved in the legal system and they often lose their phones. It is important to meet the client where they are at, meaning some outreach has to be print media.

  • Some organizations refer clients out when their mental health is poor, if they are unmedicated or mention suicide. The cost of care is another big consideration when deciding where to send someone.

Phase: Evaluate, Identify

EVALUATE

I sent out a survey asking people to give reasons why they trust the people they do and what those people did to gain their trust. The results found that trust is gained when one person in the relationship shows up consistently over time, especially when times are tough. Consistency, reliability and integrity were named as characteristics that cause trust in others.

I put together some initial plans that highlighted how the solutions would meet the user’s and business goals which I brought to YourPath during a stakeholder walkthrough. Using a decision matrix, we isolated solutions that would work within the constraints of time to implement and ease of implementation.

YourPath stakeholders identified Client and partner engagement, a social media presence and physical marketing materials as the most the important to implement while being inexpensive and low-lift.

Trust survey

Initial Solutions and Decision Matrix

Insights:

  • They want to “get in” with organizations that their clients frequent most (hospitals, jails, detox).

  • They want to have an omnichannel presence.

  • They would love to be able to tell their clients stories on social media as a way of changing how people think about recovery.

SNAG

Phase: Identify

At this point I had to pivot a little bit because the solutions I had identified did not fully reflect the needs of YourPath but they did reiterate the problems that I learned about during initial research ensuring me that I was still on track.

On my way back to the drawing board, I conducted another interview with the president and founder of a company that exemplifies putting values into practice in a way that positively effects everyone inside of and who comes in contact with the establishment. After hearing about how to establish and implement values, I did secondary research to confirm my intuition that successful businesses actively practice their values.

Insights:

  • Values work best when they are practiced and not used to justify behavior.

  • Identify potential challenges that might arise and reverse engineer how the company might handle these situations.

  • Values have to be a team decisions so that everyone is thinking about how they will help the team and the client”

  • Incorporate values as part of an employee assessment.

DELIVERABLES

I created an activity for YourPath to use when establishing values that involves the whole team. The idea is that once values are established they can be put into practice behaviorally which will trickle down to the client experience. Additionally, the new set of values will be used in outreach efforts to show client and partner organizations what they stand for and that they understand their needs. A social media plan is a good idea for YourPath because word of mouth advertising is impossible to scale.

Core Values Exercise

Fliers for partners and clients

Social Media Plan

Insights

The core values are expressed in print media because it shows an understanding of what clients and partners need—to learn about YourPath in a non-digital way. They are expressed in social media because it provides opportunity for clients to contact YourPath if they have lost their phone or computer. Frequent posting to social media will invoke the mere exposure effect, leading to partners wanting to know more.

NEXT STEPS

  • Measure engagement with social media

  • Create a content generation plan so that posting happens often enough to stay relevant in followers feeds.

  • Survey partners and clients about their experience with YourPath.

  • Make a plan to review how the company is accomplishing their value driven approach to care.