Individual Designer
E2E Mobile UX Design
2023
Designing a mobile app for field inspectors in oil & gas industry
This is an industrial inspection application designed to help inspectors and maintenance teams using SAP ERP, to capture, manage, and review inspection data on the go. I worked on the mobile experience as the sole product designer, taking the product from early concepts through to a usable inspection workflow.
Challenge
Field inspectors in oil, gas, and petrochemical environments were running mechanical integrity inspections on paper, excel or in cluttered legacy tools not built for field conditions, harsh light, gloves, unreliable connectivity, high-stakes data. That gap created inconsistent data capture and a weak link between field work and enterprise systems.
Goal
Design a mobile inspection experience that field workers can trust under real operating conditions, integrated end-to-end with SAP ERP.
Outcome
Shipped across iOS, Android, and SAP Store and adopted by 50+ field teams. Extended through 6 major releases as the platform's capabilities grew.
Research
Requirements were initially broad. I worked directly with stakeholders and subject-matter experts to ground the design in operational reality rather than assumptions, focusing on:
Environmental conditions inspectors actually work in
Task frequency and time pressure
Data criticality: what absolutely cannot be lost or misread in the field
Existing tool limitations (cluttered legacy software, paper workflows)
Stakeholder discussions
Research was structured around direct access to the people closest to the problem, not broad generic discovery:
A stakeholder interview with the COO(who has 30+ yrs on field experience), to align the design direction with business priorities from the outset.
Sessions with two subject-matter experts, each with 20+ years of field experience, to ground design decisions in operational reality rather than assumptions.
A day-in-the-life walkthrough
I sat with the client to discuss a day-in-the-life walkthrough, which surfaced key pain points and where existing tools already added value, so the redesign didn't discard what was already working. I focused on:
What an inspection actually looks like in the field
Where existing tools created friction
What information inspectors needed at a glance
Which data was critical and couldn't be lostc
How environmental conditions affected the way the product was used
What tools they currently used (they mentioned that inspectors sometimes used bluetooth devices to measure thickness readings of equipments)
Discovery
Users worked in harsh, high-risk environments
Field inspectors in oil and gas work in harsh, high-risk environments: direct sunlight, gloves, time pressure, outdoor conditions with unreliable connectivity. Before IntelliSuite, they relied on paper-based processes or cluttered legacy software not built for field use. Data was captured inconsistently, findings were hard to track, and there was no clean path from field capture to enterprise systems.
Staying connected to a stable network was hard
Connectivity couldn't be guaranteed in the field, so inspectors needed confidence that they could continue working and that their data would sync when they were back online.
Many used legacy tools and paper based methods
Legacy software was cluttered and difficult to navigate, while paper workflows made data harder to capture, track, and connect back to the larger system. The inspectors juggled between paper checklist surveys, manually writing values and then going back to a desk and re-entering the values in a desktop.
Two primary user types
Inspectors: Operational users performing inspections in high-risk, outdoor environments under time and visibility constraints.
Administrators: Configure system rules, manage access, review inspection data.
This shaped three priorities:
Reliability -> Clarity -> Speed
My Role & Strategy
I owned end to end mobile UX: research, stakeholder interviews, interaction design, visual design, and ongoing design direction as AI capabilities were layered into the product at a later stage. This wasn't a single deliverable, it was sustained ownership across six releases and a role shift from designing to leading design direction of AI-assisted diagnostics.
As the timeline for this project was 6 months for 1st MVP release I prioritised the following:
I identified two main personas:
One was the inspector, who worked on maintenance activities like doing surveys, updated inspection values and creating and updating findings from the inspections.
Two was the admin who gave access to the users by setting roles, read/write access, assigning particular equipments and locations to the users. This user worked on the SAP Platform hence this was not part of the mobile app(but a necessary requirement).
I focused on low-fidelity flows first, to simplify navigation across data-heavy screens before any visual design. A strong blueprint of the application saved much more time as we decided what the main navigation bar contained.
I conducted consistent iterative validations against inspection workflows with the stakeholders (i.e. the CEO, COO &CTO).
In the design phase I focused on the visual hierarchy, decluttering data and immediate system feedback so inspectors could read critical data at a glance, including in direct sunlight
Visual Direction
Starting point:
There were no established brand colours or style guide, so I had to explore the visual direction for the UI from scratch. I looked at how other companies used colour, particularly for status and alerts.
Design decision:
High contrast was a key requirement, so I explored a navy blue palette and tested my draft screens under direct sunlight. The testing showed that lighter text and subtle UI elements were harder to distinguish, so I increased contrast, strengthened text hierarchy, and avoided relying on low-contrast colours for important information.
Result:
The final UI was easier to scan in bright outdoor conditions, with important information and actions remaining distinguishable when inspectors were working on-site.
Key Screens & Decisions
Login
Problem:
The stakeholders wanted authentication to be simple, while keeping access controlled by the organisation. Users enter their phone number and verify it with an OTP, with access granted only to users already registered through SAP BTP.
Design decision:
Since registration happens outside the app, I didn’t want an unregistered user to simply hit a dead end. I added Useful Links instead, giving them a way to learn more about the product or contact the sales team.
Result:
Registered users get a simple phone number and OTP flow, while unregistered users have a access to contact the team and access to additional information.
Inspection management & checklist survey
Problem:
I found that SAP contained a lot of critical inspection data, but the existing table format wouldn’t work well on mobile. Through stakeholder interviews, I identified the information users needed most.
Design decision:
I prioritised key information, used semantic colours for status, added linked IDs for asset navigation, and used visual hierarchy to highlight inspection titles. I also added checklist progress to show completed and pending fields.
Result:
Users could quickly scan inspections, understand their status, access asset details, and track checklist progress.
Multi-tenant switching
Problem:
The challenge here was context. A single user could have access to multiple tenants, each representing a different client or site. This was particularly important for contract-based inspectors who might work across several client locations.
Design decision:
I introduced the tenant switcher at the top of the profile section, showing the active tenant and allowing users to switch with a single click. I also added default tenant selection during first login.
Result:
Users could quickly identify their current working environment and switch between client tenants without navigating away from their workflow.
Offline capabilities
Problem:
Field inspectors often work on-site with unreliable or unavailable network connectivity, so they needed to continue inspections without being constantly online.
Design decision:
I introduced an online/offline switch in the shell bar. By enabling a quick switch to offline mode, users could view and enter inspection data, save it locally, and sync it once connectivity was restored.
Result:
Inspectors could continue recording inspection data in areas with poor connectivity and sync their work later.
Findings and notifications
Problem:
Inspectors needed to record findings directly against an inspection and quickly identify findings that required attention.
Design decision:
I enabled findings to be created and attached to inspections from the mobile app. I also introduced colour indicators for active/inactive findings, priority notifications in list views, and filters to help users narrow down findings.
Result:
Users could capture findings at the point of inspection and quickly scan list views to understand their status, priority, and what required attention.
Attachments & adding assessment GPS locations
Problem:
Inspectors needed to record the exact location of a finding and attach supporting evidence such as images or documents directly to an inspection.
Design decision:
For findings, I suggested using satellite view by default instead of a standard map view, so inspectors could identify and record locations more accurately on-site. For attachments, I allowed users to capture images directly from the app, add markups where needed, and attach them to an inspection or finding.
Result:
Inspectors could record findings with a more accurate physical location and provide visual evidence directly from the site. The client also highlighted the satellite-based GPS experience as a crucial feature for the inspection workflow.
100+ screen delivered -> 6 Months MVP -> Agile Process
Reflection
