Designing for Property Maintenance
Latchel offers a SaaS enterprise software primarily focused on property management maintenance, allowing landlords and property managers to access their platform online. I led the redesign of their primary touchpoint—the dashboard—focused on optimizing workflows and enhancing efficiency for 10,000 users.
○ Shipped in Dec, 2021
Problem overview
The Latchel dashboard redesign was undertaken to address key issues with the existing workflow. Property managers struggled to manage residents' maintenance requests because it lacked visibility into urgent tasks, status updates and notifications forcing them to spend unnecessary time tracking work orders. I discuss more alongside while describing key personas.
Key personas
Marcus (Property Manager)
Marcus is the head property manager at his firm and manages 500 doors through his portfolio. He is tasked to take care of residents' needs, any maintenance requests, scheduling with vendors and completing all tasks.
"I have too much going on and I don't know which task needs my attention."
Ande (Resident)
Ande is a resident at the property managed by Marcus's firm. If she needs any home assistance she uses Latchel's portal to submit a work order. This work order is then processed by Julia and handled by Latchel's support staff.
"I have a leaking tap. Let me submit a maintenance request."
People impacted
The key personas shown alongside were impacted by this problem, for property managers needed better visibility into maintenance requests and vendor coordination, while support staff relied on the system for tracking, updates, and payments.
Julia (Latchel Support)
Julia is a member of support staff and she spends her workday managing new maintenance requests, updating ongoing ones, keeping property managers informed, coordinating vendor scheduling, ensuring service dispatch to the correct addresses, and processing vendor payments.
"I am here to help you take care of all urgent tasks and solve your resident's worries."
My role in dashboard 2.0
As the lead designer, I worked closely with the director of product and the lead engineer to triage priorities and drive the next version of Latchel’s dashboard. Given its importance, we provided weekly updates to the founders and reported directly to them, ensuring alignment on design, user needs, and technical execution.
Business goals & 'how might we'
Optimizing workflow efficiency
How might we streamline workflows to help property managers complete maintenance tasks faster with fewer clicks?
Improving task clarity
How might we design a dashboard that provides clear task prioritization and actionable insights without overwhelming the user?
Speeding up execution
How might we ensure vendors receive timely, accurate scheduling updates to minimize delays in service completion?
Snippets of Dashboard 2.0
01
The new dashboard is designed to immediately highlight high-priority tasks.
🎯 Goal: Improve dashboard clarity by surfacing critical work order statuses and reducing information overload.
📢 Signal: Property managers can quickly identify high-priority tasks without excessive navigation.
📊 Metric: 20% decrease in dwell time for task management.
02
A top to bottom scroll with collapsible sections, filters and tab groups allows the user to scan through heavy data.
🎯 Goal: Reduce cognitive load and improve ease of use by optimizing navigation.
📢 Signal: Users can seamlessly scroll and interact with key data points without frustration.
📊 Metric: Higher engagement rates with dashboard elements.
03
Categorizing work orders into urgent, emergency, and normal helps users quickly identify and prioritize tasks that need immediate attention.
🎯 Goal: Provide a balance of general statistics and detailed insights to enable faster decision-making.
📢 Signal: Property managers can act on maintenance requests without needing multiple clicks.
📊 Metric: Increase in work orders addressed per session.
04
This feature lets property managers check that vendors are scheduled, arrive on time, and reach the correct location.
🎯 Goal: Streamline vendor dispatching and reduce miscommunication regarding service requests.
📢 Signal: Vendors receive accurate scheduling updates, leading to fewer delays and follow-ups.
📊 Metric: Reduction in vendor complaints and higher on-time completion rates.
Open questions beyond 2.0
• Are property managers effectively engaging with the new prioritization system (urgent, emergency, normal), or do they still rely on manual tracking?
• Should we introduce real-time vendor status tracking to improve scheduling accuracy?
• How will the dashboard scale as Latchel's user base grows beyond 10,000 users?
As a next step
This solution was first tested with a group of beta users to evaluate its effectiveness and identify areas for improvement. Over the course of three months, feedback was gathered, and multiple iterations were made to refine the experience. Once the solution reaches a stable and optimized state, it will be rolled out to all users for broader adoption and critique.