Sneak Peak into HR Software Interface Redesign

Spoiler Alert: There is a sneak preview of upcoming design changes at the bottom of this post.

One of the aspects of TribeHR that we've always been particularly proud of is our easy-to-user interface. We've always worked to try and keep work-flows smooth, actions intuitive, and information accessible. That being said, we also recognize that there is always room for improvement. A few months back we released a new version of our public website (www.tribehr.com), but we haven't yet brought our application's theme in line with the new look. We're right now in the process of re-working many elements of the application user experience, and in the spirit of "We can do better!", here are a few areas that we're working on.

The first area that we're looking at is the general theme and colour palette that's being used. In the original version of TribeHR we aimed for fast, lean and minimalist. Because of that, we have very basic design elements, and the original colours were chosen for high-contrast rather than thematic unity. The result is an interface that doesn't deliver on the joy and warmth that's implied by our current public-facing website. We're working on it.

The second area that's receiving some attention is the structure of our administrative area. As TribeHR grew and we adjusted our administrative tools (e.g. we have many more vacation tracking options now than we did when we first launched) and our navigation structure struggled to keep up.

We've received comments from many directions that the navigation in the administration could benefit from some TLC and we're spending a lot of time on it. Don't worry, in the upcoming UX refresh there will be a much cleaner approach to administration navigation.

Looking at our usage numbers, the employee listing page is one of our most-frequently used pages. As we mentioned in our previous post, we've invested significant time into trying to improve performance on this page, but we're also revisiting the way this page is used. We've found three key ways in which people use this page: most administrators are using this page as a launching point for reviewing specific employees, most managers are using it as a way to see what their team is up to, and most employees are using it as a way to explore the actions of their peers. TribeHR does a great job with the first scenario right now, but it is sub-optimal for the others. We believe that there is opportunity to improve both the type of information that's included on this page as well as the layout of employee records as they relate to departments and teams. I can't share too much yet (the new layouts are still works-in-progress) but I can let you know that we're paying particular attention to the manager and employee use cases I just mentioned.

Beyond the sections that have been raised above, you'll also be seeing some changes to the work-flows and interfaces in our Reviews feature (we've figured out a way to reduce our 4-step review process down to a single step) as well as our Jobs tools (this area is used a lot, and high usage = extra attention).

In short, over the last six months we've collected a lot of information about the way people use our tools and we've identified some great ways to smooth out more rough spots while making the software look and feel more exciting to use. Although things aren't quite ready to reveal, I can offer you a sneak peak at what's coming down the pipeline!