Planning & Scheduling Optimization (PSO)

Overview

Planning & Scheduling Optimization (PSO) is an enterprise solution designed to support organizations in planning, scheduling, and optimizing workforce activities. The platform is used to manage complex operational workflows, enabling planners and dispatchers to efficiently coordinate resources, schedules, and service activities.

As Lead UX Designer, I contributed to UX modernization initiatives focused on improving usability, simplifying workflows, and aligning the experience with modern enterprise design principles.

The Challenge

Challenge

Enterprise scheduling and dispatch workflows often involve large volumes of information, complex decision-making, and multiple interconnected processes.

Users needed to:

• Manage large schedules efficiently

• Coordinate resources across multiple constraints

• Make quick operational decisions

• Navigate highly complex workflows

• Maintain productivity in fast-paced operational environments

The challenge was to explore opportunities to modernize these experiences while balancing user needs, technical constraints, and business objectives.

My Role

My Role

As Lead UX Designer, I worked closely with Product Managers, Engineers, Architects, and stakeholders to:

• Lead UX discovery activities

• Conduct workflow analysis

• Facilitate stakeholder workshops

• Identify usability opportunities

• Explore future-state concepts

• Prototype and validate ideas

• Support design system alignment

Discovery & Research

Understanding the Problem Space

To better understand user needs and workflow complexity, I participated in:

• Product discovery sessions

• Stakeholder interviews

• Workflow mapping exercises

• Competitor benchmarking

• UX reviews

• Research synthesis activities

The goal was to identify friction points, uncover modernization opportunities, and establish a foundation for future UX improvements.

Design Approach

Design Principles

The design approach focused on:

Clarity

Reducing cognitive load by simplifying how information is presented.

Efficiency

Supporting planners and dispatchers in completing tasks faster and with greater confidence.

Consistency

Aligning experiences with modern enterprise design patterns.

Scalability

Creating solutions capable of supporting increasingly complex workflows.

Solution Exploration

Concept Development

Throughout the discovery and design process, multiple concepts were explored to improve:

• Workflow navigation

• Information hierarchy

• Scheduling experiences

• Operational visibility

• User efficiency

• Decision-making support

Low and high-fidelity prototypes were used to evaluate interaction patterns and future-state experiences.

Outcomes

Outcomes

The initiative helped:

• Establish a foundation for UX modernization efforts

• Identify opportunities to simplify operational workflows

• Improve alignment with enterprise UX standards

• Support future design system adoption

• Create a shared vision across product, design, and engineering teams

While project outcomes evolved over time, the work contributed to broader efforts focused on improving enterprise planning and scheduling experiences.

Key Learnings

Key Learnings

Designing for enterprise operations reinforced the importance of:

• Deep workflow understanding

• Stakeholder collaboration

• Research-driven design decisions

• Balancing business and user needs

• Designing for scalability and complexity

Enterprise UX is often less about screens and more about helping users make better decisions within highly complex environments.