SIS Shift management
Tablet
B2B
Workforce management
Enterprise UX
Offline-first design
Research
Testing
Impact
Six months after launch, the client reported measurable improvements in operational efficiency and reporting accuracy.
100% reduction in record tampering
Digital attendance tracking prevented guards from falsifying records.
50% increase in unit adoption
Security officers who adopted the system began assisting others during rollout, accelerating adoption across operational units.
70% reduction in customer complaints
Security officers were able to identify staffing shortages earlier and resolve them before impacting clients.
Improvement in user satisfaction
Officers reported that daily shift management tasks were significantly easier compared to managing paper registers.
Project introduction
SIS Group Enterprise is a private security services company operating across India, Australia, and, New Zealand, deploying security personnel to banks, hotels, residential complexes, and corporate offices.
At each site, security officers are responsible for managing guards, assigning them to posts, tracking attendance, and generating reports for clients.
Before this project, these responsibilities were managed entirely through paper registers. Officers manually recorded shift assignments, attendance, and incidents throughout the day. At the end of each shift, they reviewed these logs to produce reports for clients.
This paper-based process created significant operational challenges, particularly as officers were often responsible for 20–25 guards across multiple locations.
To improve operational visibility and reporting accuracy, SIS wanted to introduce a tablet-based shift management application for security officers.
The Problem
The paper register workflow created several operational and reporting issues:
Attendance records were easily manipulated
Guards could alter register entries to falsify attendance, making it difficult to verify who had actually worked a shift.
Staff shortages were difficult to track
Security officers had limited visibility into which posts were understaffed, especially when managing multiple shifts and locations.
Client reporting required time-consuming manual review
Generating shift reports required officers to review multiple registers and reconcile attendance records.
Customer complaints were increasing
Clients frequently reported missing guards or inaccurate reporting, which impacted service reliability.
My role
I worked as the UX Designer on this project alongside a visual designer, collaborating closely with the client’s product management and development teams.
My responsibilities included:
Understanding product requirements and operational workflows
Guards could alter register entries to falsify attendance, making it difficult to verify who had actually worked a shift.
Designing and validating solutions
Guards could alter register entries to falsify attendance, making it difficult to verify who had actually worked a shift.
Delivering production-ready designs
Guards could alter register entries to falsify attendance, making it difficult to verify who had actually worked a shift.
Beyond execution, I also contributed to several key product decisions:
• Proposed capturing punch-in and punch-out events using the tablet camera to prevent attendance tampering
• Advocated for simplifying the product by separating complex shift configuration from daily shift management tasks
• Challenged the initial assumption that the product should be completely self-explanatory, securing agreement for minimal user training on complex workflows
Users & Research
Security officer managing 20–25 guards across multiple branches, non-technical, beginner-level English
His responsibilities include:
• Assigning guards to posts for each shift
• Managing last-minute absences or shortages
• Generating shift reports for the client
Before the application, Rajesh relied entirely on paper registers to manage these tasks.
Key insights
Familiar mobile interactions worked well
• Most officers regularly used WhatsApp and Facebook on their smartphones.
• During prototype testing, users were able to understand drag-and-drop interactions quickly, especially when assigning guards to posts.
• This indicated we could rely on visual manipulation instead of form-heavy workflows.
Text input was slow and error-prone
• Typing on an English keyboard was difficult for many users.
• Tasks that required filling out form fields significantly slowed down the workflow and increased errors.
• This suggested the interface should minimize typing wherever possible.
Users understood task-specific English terminology
Although overall literacy levels were low, users recognized words related to their daily work such as:
• Shifts
• Vacancies
• Posts
This meant an English interface could work if vocabulary remained tightly tied to their domain.
Design challenges
Several constraints significantly shaped the design approach.
Low digital literacy
Many users had never used enterprise software before. The interface had to rely on simple, learnable interactions.
No internet access
Some security officers operate in remote locations with no connectivity.
The system needed to support offline workflows with delayed data synchronization.
English-only interface
The client insisted the application launch in English with no localization planned.
No training budget
The product team initially expected the application to be completely self-explanatory.
Through discussions with the client, we secured agreement for minimal training focused on complex tasks.
