Design nudges + field guides for responding to emergency situations.
Part I: LegalFAQ Design Nudges
When cities began rolling out Emergency Rental Assistance Programs (ERAP) during the height COVID-19 pandemic, many people did not know how to access available funds. LegalFAQ.org↗, a platform that provides information and resources to help people facing housing-related legal issues, wanted to change that. My challenge was to direct clients to rental assistance funds available in their state. After conducting some quick user research, I designed an emergency alert banner and breadcrumb trail for the LegalFAQ.org homepage.
Part II: Emergency Design Field Guides
Many legal aid organizations similar to LegalFAQ.org were caught by surprise when they had to transition their services online during the pandemic and struggled to adapt. I wondered how we might create scalable guidance around basic design principles that would help legal professionals redesign their virtual presence in future emergency situations. Inspired by Dana Chisnell’s “Field Guides to Ensuring Voter Intent”, I designed a series of short “Emergency Design Field Guides” that describe actionable steps legal organizations can take to ensure that they are still able to reach their clients no matter what.
Role
UX/UI + Graphic Designer
Timeline
3 weeks
Team
Project Manager ● Engineer
Client
Stanford Legal Design Lab
Helping 400+ daily LegalFAQ users find emergency funds.
+
Actionable design guidance for legal professionals.
Part I:
Design Nudges
01/ Audit
The LegalFAQ.org website has two main purposes:
1. To provide accessible legal information.
2. To direct users to relevant legal, financial and other resources.
02/ User testing
I asked several participants to use the LegalFAQ.org website to locate ERAP funds available in their state. It became apparent that participants were using the search bar and getting lost in the information flow, rather than scrolling down to the resources under the "Get Help" heading.
👨🏽🦱
“There's so much helpful information here, but for some parts, I don't really know until I scroll that it exists.”
-Participant
03/ Prototyping banners
Most LegalFAQ.org clients access the website on their phones, so I focused on mobile design. Rather than redesigning the entire homepage, which would take significant time and investment, I decided to create a banner to alert website visitors about emergency funds.
04/ Spotlighting funds
The homepage banner links to a search bar for clients to type their state, after which they are taken to the financial resources available in their state. I designed a full-width card in the same yellow as the banner to highlight the link to that state's ERAP funds, to visually signal to clients that they are on the right track.
Part II:
Emergency Design Field Guides
I decided to use LegalFAQ.org to serve as a case study to distill some basic design guidance for legal professionals needing to adapt their virtual presence during emergency situations. This took the form of short field guides that cover the essential topics, including website design, content design, visual design, and distribution channels.
These field guides were made publicly available through the Stanford Legal Design Lab. Check them out below:
