Designing complex systems is a challenge many of us face daily, trying to highlight crucial information without causing visual overload and cognitive fatigue. Here are some tips to help when approaching the design and layout of complex systems:
Understand business goals, intermediary objectives, needs and desires, physical and digital challenges, stages, and processes. Talk to product users. Document these insights, combined with ideation sessions with other project team members. If possible, conduct a design sprint.
Users generally prefer jumping straight in rather than watching tutorial videos. Provide onboarding and guidance that helps users understand their tasks. Consider pop-up wizards explaining features, tooltips offering explanations, or visual cues like word count limits in specific fields. Use completion indicators (e.g., green highlights) to show progress, motivating users to continue.
Maintain consistency with behaviors users are familiar with from other complex systems they use regularly. Users appreciate familiar patterns and behaviors.
Give users the chance to make errors but also offer optimal guidance, information quantity limits, and success/error indicators.
Ensure users can navigate back and forth within processes (e.g., wizards). Avoid unnecessary pop-ups and maintain consistency in the process, offering transparency about their current actions and progress.
Ensure the system is consistent so users can quickly understand their actions without needing to learn each step anew. This reduces learning time and boosts confidence and success in using new features
Help users visually track their actions and save information on the go to reduce cognitive load.
Make essential information more visual. Remove icons that don’t serve a purpose and emphasize crucial details for the user.
Help users visually track their actions and save information on the go to reduce cognitive load.
Make essential information more visual. Remove icons that don’t serve a purpose and emphasize crucial details for the user.
Make filters and data prominent, preferably placing filters at the top rather than the side. Avoid hover windows as they can frustrate users by appearing and disappearing unpredictably.
By following these principles, you can create user-friendly, intuitive, and efficient complex systems that meet user needs and enhance their experience.
