Case study / Enterprise plant operations
Connecting orders to production batches
An internal application for a galvanising plant. Planners find an order, check its batch on the line and review material requirements. I connected this information across the schedule, production board and inspection record.
01
Problem
At a hot-dip galvanising plant, steel parts receive a protective coating. The planner needs to release orders to the line on time and know where the work is. A production batch can include material from several customers’ orders.
The previous workflow kept the schedule, the batch’s position and material requirements in separate records. Answering a question about an order meant asking the inspector and operator to reconstruct the context.
I redesigned the internal application’s working screens. This case focuses on connecting an order to its batch on the line and its initial inspection information, so the planner can agree the next step.
02
Research
Research question
Where order context gets lost
I wanted to understand what the planner rechecks before releasing an order and where the inspector’s information stops accompanying the material.
I compared the schedule, travellers and production records, focusing on an urgent order within a shared batch, a material preparation question and clarification with a customer. I chose two connected views: orders by deadline and batches by stage.
- Staff members
- 8
- 4 planners, 2 inspectors and 2 operators. Interviews and tasks involved the same people.
- Orders
- 12
- Traced orders through receipt, preparation and production, including batches containing several orders.
- Contextual interviews
- Order walkthroughs
- Relationship mapping
- Two task rounds
Industry material helped distinguish preparation, galvanising and final inspection. It informed the design context; decisions for this plant were checked against its own workflow.
Process and initial inspection
American Galvanizers Association material explains preparation and pre-inspection. It helped me keep material information distinct from the order’s administrative status.
03
Insights
An order is not a batch
An order carries the customer commitment and deadline. On the line, several orders may be processed in one batch. Showing only one object loses either the customer commitment or the production context. One batch’s stage does not establish that the whole order is complete.
BasisIn 5 of the 12 orders reviewed, material shared a batch with other orders.
A status does not explain requirements
A preparation status does not explain the selected recipe or what the inspector noticed. The next colleague needs the inspection information attached to the material.
BasisMaterial requirements needed a separate clarification in 4 of the 12 walkthroughs.
Urgency needs production context
The nearest deadline helps select an order, but does not locate its batch. Choosing the next work requires the deadline, batch contents and current stage.
BasisIn the tasks, planners first found the order, then checked its position on the line.
04
Jobs and hypotheses
I defined two planner jobs. The tasks tested whether the screens helped staff find the work, choose an order and match requirements to a material.
Business hypotheses
Retain the order-to-batch relationship
If stage-board cards retain the orders within a batch, planners will locate the required work more accurately because they will not need to reconstruct batch contents from separate lists.
- Basis
- One batch can contain several customer orders.
- How I tested it
- Four planners completed equivalent tasks locating selected order material, its batch and stage in two rounds. Success required all three without a hint; errors by two or more would trigger a card revision.
Supported in the tasks
2 of 4 succeeded in round one and 4 of 4 in round two. The same tasks also informed the order–batch distinction check in I2.
Design decision
Kept order references with the dip, jig and recipe on the board, while retaining a separate schedule row for each order.
Keep requirements with the material
If the recipe, hanging check, photo and notes share the material record, colleagues will need fewer repeated preparation questions because they can match the information to the specific part.
- Basis
- A short readiness entry did not carry enough preparation context.
- How I tested it
- Two inspectors and two operators found the recipe and note for a specified material. All four needed to match both to the correct part without a hint; otherwise the grouping would be revised.
Supported for information handover
2 of 4 correctly matched the recipe and note to the material in round one, and all 4 in round two. This supported the information grouping. The task did not measure the frequency of follow-up questions.
Design decision
Grouped material and processing fields in the main form, retaining the photo and comments in the same record.
Interface hypotheses
Show urgency in context
If date, priority and status share an order row, planners can choose an order needing attention without opening every record to compare them.
- Basis
- A date alone does not show whether work has started or its agreed priority.
- How I tested it
- Four planners selected an order using the given date, status and priority. All four needed a correct explanation; otherwise the column order would be reconsidered.
Supported
In round one, 1 of 4 selected the correct order and explained the date, status and priority; the others considered only the date. All 4 met the full criterion in round two.
Design decision
Kept dates, Priority and Status in the same row, with date, customer and status filters above the schedule.
Distinguish orders from batches
If a batch card shows its production identifiers and order list, planners will be less likely to read it as one customer order because the batch contents remain visible.
- Basis
- Orders and batches are different units with different states.
- How I tested it
- Asked four planners to explain what the card represents and which orders it includes. All needed to distinguish the objects; recurring confusion would require a new card structure.
Supported
All 4 distinguished the objects in round two, compared with 2 of 4 in round one. The card describes a batch rather than each order’s individual deadline.
Design decision
Separated dip and jig identifiers, recipe and the Orders list; kept the administrative status in the schedule.
05
User journey
The map follows the planner from choosing an order to reviewing the queue. The previous workflow is separated from my decisions. The inspector records the initial inspection; the planner uses that information.
- Role
- Production planner
- Scenario
- Check an urgent order whose material is processed in a batch with other orders.
-
Choose an order
- Goal
- Find work with an approaching deadline.
- Actions and touchpoints
- Compares dates in an office spreadsheet and asks the shop floor about the order.Order spreadsheet, colleagues’ messages.
- Difficulty
- Urgency and current work are recorded in different places.
- Need
- See the date, priority and state of one order together.
- My decisions
- Combined dates, priority, status and filters in the schedule.
- Screens
-
Check customer context
When needed- Goal
- Know whom to contact about a technical question.
- Actions and touchpoints
- Looks for the customer contact and earlier order discussions.Customer record, notes, order history.
- Difficulty
- The accounts contact may not know the material requirements.
- Need
- Identify the engineering contact and see previous work.
- My decisions
- Separated contact roles and retained recent orders and notes in the customer record.
- Screens
-
Check the material
- Goal
- Clarify requirements before agreeing the work.
- Actions and touchpoints
- Checks the traveller and asks the inspector about material preparation.Traveller, initial inspection record.
- Difficulty
- A short description can omit a visible issue or hanging requirement.
- Need
- Match requirements and comments to the specific material.
- My decisions
- Grouped the recipe, hanging check, photo and comments in the material record.
- Screens
-
Locate the batch
- Goal
- Find the current stage of the required work.
- Actions and touchpoints
- Looks for the order number in production records and asks where the batch is.Production list, conversation with an operator.
- Difficulty
- One batch can include several orders; a flat list does not make this relationship clear.
- Need
- Find the order within its batch and identify the stage.
- My decisions
- Placed batches in eight stage columns, retaining their order numbers on each card.
- Screens
-
Check contents and priority
- Goal
- Discuss the next step for the correct batch.
- Actions and touchpoints
- Compares order numbers, the recipe and urgency information.Batch, included orders, jig information.
- Difficulty
- The urgency of one order can be confused with unrelated work.
- Need
- See batch contents, stage and priority together.
- My decisions
- Retained the dip, jig, recipe, orders and a separate priority marker on the card.
- Screens
-
Review the order queue
- Goal
- Check the plan before agreeing it with the shop floor.
- Actions and touchpoints
- Returns to the order list to compare deadlines with the production state found.Order schedule, production board.
- Difficulty
- A batch stage and an order’s administrative status describe different things.
- Need
- Check both views while retaining the order reference.
- My decisions
- Kept separate order and batch views, with order references connecting their information.
The columns reflect this plant’s workflow. The map does not assume automatic line updates or technical decisions made by the application. A batch stage does not replace the state of the whole order.
06
Interface decisions
An order has two contexts: the customer commitment in the schedule and its batch’s work on the line. Material requirements connect the information.
Batch contents stay visible at every stage
I arranged production cards across eight stages from hanging to dispatch. Each retains the dip, jig, recipe and order references, so the planner can find work while seeing what is processed together.
Orders can be compared on working criteria
I kept dates alongside priority, status and filters in the schedule. View and Edit belong to the selected row. Planners can compare orders before opening the relevant details, keeping administrative fields off the production board.
Inspection stays with the material
I combined initial material fields with the recipe and hanging check. Photos and comments identify the part a note refers to. In the customer record, I separated engineering and accounts contacts and kept recent orders nearby for clarification.
Screens by stage
Choose a screen or scroll the row. Open any design to inspect the full screen.
07
Design validation
Across two rounds with the same eight staff members, I tested batch finding, order selection and reading an inspection record. Between rounds, I revised the information grouping and repeated the tasks with different orders of comparable difficulty. The results for each task appear below.
A batch card was read as an order
- Difficulty
- In round one, 2 of 4 planners read a card as a single order and missed the other orders being processed with it.
- What I changed
- I separated production identifiers from the Orders list and retained the list on the card. In round two, all 4 correctly explained the batch contents and found the required order.
The nearest date dominated the choice
- Difficulty
- In round one, only 1 of 4 planners chose the correct order and explained the date, status and priority. The other three relied on the date alone.
- What I changed
- I placed dates, Priority and Status in the same schedule row. All 4 planners in round two explained their choice using all three signals, then checked the batch stage on the board.
A short note lost its subject
- Difficulty
- During requirements handover, 2 of the 4 inspectors and operators could not confidently match a note to the material and processing method.
- What I changed
- I kept the recipe, photo and comments in the material record. In round two, all 4 found the recipe and note without a hint and matched them to the correct part.
08
Results
I presented the order, material and batch sequence to colleagues, then walked through an urgent order in a shared batch and an inspector’s preparation question. After the first review, I clarified the order–batch distinction. The second review agreed the screen structure for development.
Across two rounds, I compared three interface tasks before and after the revisions. Four planners completed the first two; two inspectors and two operators completed the third. Each person attempted each assigned task once per round.
- Find the batch and stage without help
- Before revisions2 of 4After revisions4 of 4
- Four planners located the batch for a given order and named its stage. Success meant identifying the correct material, batch and stage without a hint. Order references on the cards and stage columns kept that relationship visible.
- Choose an order using all three signals
- Before revisions1 of 4After revisions4 of 4
- The same four planners selected the order needing attention. Success required the correct choice and an explanation covering date, status and priority. I placed these signals in the same schedule row.
- Find the correct recipe and note
- Before revisions2 of 4After revisions4 of 4
- Two inspectors and two operators found the processing recipe and note for a given material. Success meant matching both to the correct part without a hint. I grouped the recipe, photo and comments in the material record.
Each result counts successful attempts out of four for that task. The same people returned in round two with different data of comparable difficulty. This tests interface usability; familiarity may have contributed to the improvement. The small groups do not establish results for all plant staff.
