Guiding Contractors to Better Subcontractor Choices
At Bespoke Metrics, our Compass application aimed to guide General Contractors (GCs) through pre-construction risk. Yet, a problem persisted: GCs struggled to truly assess a Subcontractor’s on-site capabilities before hiring.
Our mission, starting March 2019, was to create the “Performance Review” feature. GCs needed more than our “Q Score”—a rating of business, finance, and safety; they needed real insight into actual on-site work. They were tired of unreliable reference checks, and Subcontractors wanted a fair chance to showcase their quality. As Lead Designer, with a small dev team and a Product Owner, I set out to build this crucial transparency into subcontractor selection.
Info:
- Project: Performance Review For Subcontractors
- Role: Lead Product Designer Duration: 4 weeks (Design Phase), 8 weeks (Dev Phase)
- Date: March 2019
Target Users & Their Needs:
GC Risk Managers: Needed reliable, real-world feedback on Subcontractor job-site performance beyond existing data, without time-consuming reference checks.
Subcontractors: Sought honest project feedback and a way to differentiate themselves beyond the Q Score to win more contracts.
Our path wasn’t smooth: tight deadlines, limited resources for our small team, and internal doubts about the feature’s necessity tested our resolve.
Design Process:
Discovery & Scoping: Leveraging existing GC and Subcontractor personas, we aligned with the PO on project goals, MVP scope, and addressed potential issues like managing negative reviews. We framed our challenge with “How Might We” questions to improve GC access to performance data and help Subcontractors showcase their work.
Research & Ideation: We analyzed different rating systems (Google, Amazon, Yelp, clothing websites) for best practices in layout and interaction. “Crazy 8s” sketching exercises helped generate diverse layout ideas.
Design & Iteration:
I developed lo-fi wireframes for top concepts, while the PO defined evaluation criteria based on GC input.
Prototyping & Testing (Round 1): Initial prototypes, influenced by Yelp and the founder preferred blue, we faced challenges due to a concurrent company-wide branding redesign.
Prototyping & Testing (Round 2): Feedback indicated the UI was “too blue” and star ratings unclear. We iterated towards a cleaner design with more white space and simplified data visualization.
Prototyping & Testing (Round 3): When testing with some General Contractors, users struggled to find the feature (initially buried in Subcontractor profiles) and lacked submission confirmation. We resolved this by adding “Performance Review” to the main navigation and implementing toast notifications.
Outcomes & Lessons Learned: Launched in April 2019, the Performance Review feature became highly valued by GCs. One client stated, “It’s the only feature we use or need! It’s great.”
Impact: Successfully provided GCs with richer, on-site performance data for Subcontractor selection.
Challenges Met: Delivered despite timeline pressures and evolving UI standards.
Key Learnings:
The project timeline was extended due to the simultaneous company-wide UI redesign.
Future iterations would benefit from testing with a broader user base, including Subcontractors, beyond initial GC and internal feedback.
Gained significant insights into the specific needs and values of Risk Managers.