NewDays Desktop Application by Inn Sun Park and Yoyo Dong is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2022 Bronze A' Design Award in Interface, Interaction and User Experience Design Competition Category.
BronzeInterface· 2022
NewDays Desktop Application
Client: Igjy
Bronze A' Design Award Winner in Interface Category
Verified Award Winner
Verify Award Status for #136260The Design
About NewDays Desktop Application
NewDays is a cross-platform product for the new normal work environment. The manner in which teams communicate and collaborate has changed since the pandemic began. The absence of physical interaction has left employees more disconnected than ever. As a result, managers face the challenge of leading a team in a completely virtual setting. NewDays provides managers with the necessary tools to help maintain team morale, oversee performance, identify problems flagged by members, and orient new employees. Multiple design iterations and in-depth research developed the UX/UI of this product.
The Recognition
About the Bronze A' Design Award
NewDays Desktop Application is a Bronze A' Design Award winner, a highly prestigious recognition granted to outstanding designs distinguished by creativity, ingenuity, and astuteness. Bronze winners are amply skillful and strikingly creative artifacts that authenticate the vast experience, imagination, and resourcefulness of their designers. NewDays Desktop Application is expected to be a highly regarded, admired, and cherished object that is notably professional and innovative. This Bronze A' Design Award-winning design incorporates best practices in art, science, design, and technology, and is excellent for its attention to detail. NewDays Desktop Application splendidly satisfies needs, touches desires, charms feelings, and appeals to curiosity.
Interviews
Design Interview
What is the main principle, idea and inspiration behind your design?
As the new environment has brought both advantages and disadvantages, I wanted to develop an innovative product for the remote work environment with my teammates because the current methods make people feel disconnected and onboarding more difficult for new employees.
What has been your main focus in designing this work? Especially what did you want to achieve?
Innovation creates a solution that improves people's lives. This idea will help managers onboard new remote employees to the team, and the organization will create a better remote work environment. As this is a solution that can enhance the quality of a remote work environment, it is an innovative product.
What are your future plans for this award winning design?
If we discover new needs, we may add a few more features or refine an existing one.
Grand Interview
Your innovative approach to addressing remote work challenges through NewDays Desktop Application has earned recognition with the Bronze A' Design Award - could you elaborate on how your extensive research phase shaped the final user experience design?
Our research phase was foundational. We began by conducting interviews with managers and team members across various industries. Using affinity diagramming, we identified common themes: a lack of connection, difficulties with onboarding, and challenges in recognizing team performance. These insights directly informed our design—each feature in NewDays maps back to a real need we uncovered. The user experience was crafted to feel intuitive, emotionally intelligent, and supportive of daily remote workflows.
The absence of physical workplace interactions emerged as a key challenge that NewDays Desktop Application aims to solve - what specific insights from your affinity diagram research led to the development of the welcome cards and kudos features?
During our research, many participants expressed how isolating it felt to join a new team remotely, and how casual recognition—like a quick “good job” in the office—was missing in virtual spaces. We noticed these touchpoints, though small, played a big role in team cohesion. That inspired the welcome cards to create a warm first impression for newcomers and the kudos page to foster peer-to-peer appreciation. Both features are lightweight but powerful in making virtual teams feel more human.
Your team created multiple design iterations for NewDays Desktop Application using various tools like Sketch, Figma, and Adobe XD - how did this multi-platform approach influence the final user interface decisions?
Each tool brought unique strengths. We used Sketch and Adobe XD for early concept exploration and quick mockups, then Figma became our main tool for collaboration due to its cloud-based, real-time capabilities. This iterative, multi-platform workflow allowed us to test ideas quickly, get feedback faster, and co-design efficiently as a remote team. It also helped ensure the UI was not only visually polished but also flexible and accessible across various user platforms.
Behind the Design
Press Kit
Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.
- Unique Properties
- NewDays is a cross-platform product for the new work environment. The absence of face-to-face workplace interactions has left employees more disconnected than ever, and managers are facing the challenge of leading a team in a completely virtual setting. NewDays provides managers with the tools to help maintain team morale, oversee performance, identify problems flagged by members, as well as onboard new employees.
- Dimensions & Packaging
- Cross-platform desktop application for better work environment and team's communication.
- Tags
- Services Design, Desktop Application, Responsive Design, User Experience, User Interface, Interaction Design, Digital Interaction
- Production Technology
- We used Sketch, Figma, Adobe XD, After Effect, and Miro Board to design the UX and UI of this desktop application. In addition, we used many research tools like user journey maps and service blueprints to design the experience.
- Design Challenge
- It was challenging to figure out the core needs for the current remote work environment. We also had to ask multiple questions to come up with our initial product idea. After we decided to set managers as target users for our product because of the product's scalability, we had to spend an extensive amount of time building the ideal user journey for our target users. Simplifying the complicated information on the interface design was also challenging.
- Research
- During the initial stage, we created an affinity diagram and interviewed people to understand the current work environment. We discovered many pain points that the managers were experiencing, then we went back to the group of research participants to test our low-fidelity mock-ups. We were able to gain insightful findings around its usability as well as its viability as a proof of concept. We created quick prototypes to A/B test with the group multiple times before finalizing our product design.
- Inspiration
- The ways in which teams communicate and work together have changed a lot since the pandemic began. As the new environment brought both advantages and disadvantages, the current methods we use have some difficulties for managers to have an overview, encourage each team member, and to onboard new remote employees. Considering the various remote work environment stress points, we designed a cross platform that would solve problems mentioned above in the current process.
- Project Duration
- The project started in September 2021 through remote collaboration. It is an ongoing process with updates depending on new needs.
- Operation Flow
- The home page dashboard is where managers can see things that need their attention. Welcome cards are collaborative cards that are shareable within the team. The project pages display an overview of where the project is at and the timeline the team member needs help with. There is also a section dedicated for resources relevant to the project space that helps transition work more efficiently. The kudos page highlights team's performances throughout their week in a more informal way.
- Team Members
- Inn Sun Park
Gabriela Sudirja
Jing Qiao
Yoyo Dong
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