Pointellis v2

TLDR

Lead Product Designer @ Pointellis

September 2019 - November 2021

Designed a supply chain platform that connects stakeholders creating individualized cell and gene therapies (ICGT) so that the cost of life saving treatment is widely accessible to those in need.

Tools:
Miro, Figma

Methods:
Competitive analysis, service blueprints, journey maps, prioritization exercises, interviews, conceptual testing, prototyping

Individualized cell and gene therapies (ICGT) are highly effective life saving treatments that are costly to create and difficult to produce at scale - which is why there are so few of them. 

ICGT drugs are made for a specific patient, using a sample from the patient. It requires a different approach to manufacturing as it can’t be mass produced the same way other medicines or vaccines are created. Additionally, ICGT drugs are not created in a single place by a single company. Making an ICGT drug requires the patient, hospital, manufacturing and transportation stakeholders to coordinate with one another to make sure their timing, supplies, and capacity aligns with one another. This coordination is crucial when dealing with terminally ill patients and handling time and temperature sensitive material. 

 

I worked with our collaboration partners to create an end-to-end journey map that outlined the people and processes involved. To ensure the problem we solved were industry wide, the journey map was reinforced with findings from industry articles and interviews I conducted with industry experts.

 

The research uncovered challenges and personas for those in the manufacturing space

Challenges

  • Slots represent the number of treatments that can start manufacturing per day and are mandated by the FDA. At this point no company had more than 5 slots per day.

  • Each slot would be occupied for 22 days while the treatment was being manufactured, which means missing an opportunity to manufacture a treatment could be deadly for the patient.

  • There are a lot of failure points before a sample arrives at manufacturing. For example a patient might miss their appointment to have a sample taken or be too sick to have a sample taken. There might be transit problems along the way, so the patient’s sample becomes unviable or they miss their original slot. 

Meet the Slot Manager

Slot managers are responsible for managing the slot capacity, coordinating with hospitals and transportation stakeholders, and triaging any problems that arise.

Their goal is to make sure every slot gets used .

They need to be able to anticipate a problem before it happens and move patients around to different slots.


 

I took the findings and facilitated kick-off sessions with the product and engineering team to co-create the MVP.

Over the course of a few days the team would gather to review findings of the problem space/personas and collectively brainstorm solutions. Solutions were prioritized based on complexity and user value which shaped the MVP features, then everyone would get the opportunity to sketch what the MVP features could look like and dot vote on what they liked - driving the first iteration of designs.

 

Working with our collaboration partners I iteratively designed and concept tested the solutions below. 

Improve Transparency

Monthly calendar view communicates capacity status at-a-glance. Color coding, iconography and shading provide visibility into how many slots are available per day and the progress of the patient’s sample to the manufacturing site. This ensures the Slot Manager won’t miss an opportunity to create a treatment and can anticipate when treatments are falling behind. (See iterations to the left).

 

Provide Details

Slot view shows key information about the treatment that’s aligned to that slot. With insight into how a treatment’s progressing and the ability to view forecasted vs actual dates of each step in the process, the Slot Manager can make quick yet informed decisions and take immediate action.

(See iterations to the left - final designs on the right)

Handle the Unhappy Path

The modify/remove flows are a guided experience that breaks down a complex process into manageable tasks and introduces automation. In a focused space, the Slot Manager can select different types of modifications, capture the reason for modifying, select a new date for the sample to begin manufacturing, and select a new treatment to backfill the original slot. Additionally, when selecting a new date the calendar will only show days with available slots and will show how the new dates for key steps to better communicate with upstream/downstream partners. (See steps in the process to the left)

Created a Sitemap + Flows

The design team documented the sitemap, flows, default behaviors, and logic for the engineering and product team to reference.

 

Lessons Learned

This project gave me a taste of what it’s like working in a startup environment. I learned so much about working with unknowns and how to be a better partner to the product and engineering teams. During my time on Pointellis I learned three major lessons:

  1. Have a design perspective on outstanding questions instead of waiting for an answer

  2. Be diligent in leveraging what exists and build on top of what you have

  3. Give the engineering team time to research new functionality before asking them to implement