Subject area:                 Healthcare UX Strategy

Region:                           United-States, Boston, MA

Industry:                        Healthcare industry, focus on COVID-19 vaccine development

Company:                      GoInvo

Timeframe:                   Fall 2020

Decision Maker:          Juhan Sonin

Challenge:                     In the fall of 2020, Juhan Sonin, leader of the healthcare user experience design firm GoInvo in Boston, MA was looking to create a product that would help people understand when they would receive their COVID-19 vaccine. COVID-19 turned the world upside down, rapidly forcing people to move their lives online. As the COVID-19 was beginning to be distributed, Juhan had to decide how to create a product that would be useful, engaging, and effective in decreasing confusion around the vaccine. However, he had to act quickly to ensure he was the first on the market with one of these tools. Sydney was excited to begin this project and apply strategy, public health, and design frameworks to solve this problem for Juhan.

Investment in Personal Capital: Elucidating Professional CORE

In 2020, Sydney Formica, a Master of Public Health and Experience Design Graduate student at Northeastern University, was preparing to embark on her professional journey in public health and user experience (UX) design after graduation. Before beginning to apply to full-time opportunities, Sydney wanted to gain experience in her field and show potential employers what she had to offer. After researching several healthcare UX agencies, she was impressed by the scope of work being done at GoInvo and wanted to engage with them and apply the skills she had been learning in class.

Investments in Social Capital: Building Trust within the Company and Industry

To help Juhan decide on a direction to go in for his COVID-19 vaccine distribution map, Sydney conducted a wide variety of market research and learned followed the news to find information about the rapidly changing national vaccine distribution plan. From this, she was able to conduct an analysis of the political, economic, sociological, technological, legal, and environmental (PESTLE) context of the project and GoInvo. She also learned about the company and its competitors, which allowed her to begin an analysis of the opportunities and readiness of GoInvo in relation to the topic of the project. Sydney also interviewed Juhan and several members of the design studio on numerous occasions to solidify what their needs where, how their process flowed, and what they wanted to achieve from the project. From there, she was able to apply public health frameworks and determine what the best use-case was for the product.

Investments in Professional Capital: Analysing Market Needs, Crating an Industry Map

From her analysis, Sydney determined that GoInvo should target the people who would be last to receive the vaccine and do so with socioeconomic implications in mind. By providing this tool, GoInvo could provide comfort and direction to people in this position by allowing them to have a better idea of when the burden of the pandemic would be alleviated. This would allow for easier planning. Further, Sydney realized that tools like this were not available on the market, and by being first to create one, GoInvo could gain notoriety for their innovative thinking.

Capital Utilization: What’s next? 

This project helped Sydney develop a better understanding of the field of healthcare UX and the ethos around the products made. GoInvo’s focus on ethical products and improving healthcare quality and access was inspiring. She will keep this mindset for the remainder of her career and will never forget the experience of working with a company like GoInvo.