When writing my bug list, I discovered that the thing that bugged me the most was also an opportunity that I believe affects me and every other UF student, as well as the university itself. The issue is the web services that the university offers, for example, there is ONE.UF, which offers services like the degree audit, registering for classes and viewing the class schedule; then there is Canvas, which is the eLearning tool for most classes, and has a calendar with all of the assignments; the Gator Cloud's primary function is the student email, but it also has a calendar, which is not synched to the one on canvas, this is annoying because having two calendars can be confusing ans simply complicates things; there is also myUFL, which handles the tuition payment and other finances, as well as other services such as buying gator tickets. This is a problem for both the student and the university. For the student it is time consuming, and can complicate things when trying to find a specific service amongst all of these websites; it is also a problem for the university, because it is costing the university for having multiple servers to host the webstites, as well as the extra IT salary.
Prototypical Customers
All 3 prototypical customers that were interviewed were UF students, all three completely agreed that it is too complicated to use the multiple websites as they currently are, and there should be simpler solution. One of interviewees was especially more aware of the problem because he is a transfer student from Santa Fe College, where all of these services are hosted on one single website. They currently are all adressing this need by using each website separately, as there is no way around it, which is not a satisfactory solution.
At first, I believed that the opportunity presented was only for the students, but later I realized that it was also an opportunity for the university, because of this, I believe that my new opportunity than when I started.
In my opinion, there should be a balance between adapting the opportunity and staying firm, as it may be the case that at first the idea you have is not exactly what the customer needs, but if you listen too much to customer feedback, they do not always know what exactly it is that they need, and you could stray further from the original idea.
Prototypical Customers
All 3 prototypical customers that were interviewed were UF students, all three completely agreed that it is too complicated to use the multiple websites as they currently are, and there should be simpler solution. One of interviewees was especially more aware of the problem because he is a transfer student from Santa Fe College, where all of these services are hosted on one single website. They currently are all adressing this need by using each website separately, as there is no way around it, which is not a satisfactory solution.
At first, I believed that the opportunity presented was only for the students, but later I realized that it was also an opportunity for the university, because of this, I believe that my new opportunity than when I started.
In my opinion, there should be a balance between adapting the opportunity and staying firm, as it may be the case that at first the idea you have is not exactly what the customer needs, but if you listen too much to customer feedback, they do not always know what exactly it is that they need, and you could stray further from the original idea.
Andres, you are so right on that one! I also believe that it is very cluttered, and sometimes not user friendly. Especially when it is all over the place, we have like five different links to access all over, this is a great idea. This is a new opportunity, and I wish it were fixed and somehow easier to navigate through like that.
ReplyDeleteAndres, UF web services are what bothers me the most. I can’t stand having to use so many websites. As I’m also a transfer student, I was used to having only one website in my past college. You did a great job identifying this opportunity. I also agree that there should be a balance between adapting the opportunity and staying firm. Great submission!
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