Automation - Energy Data Application

Gorilla is a software scale-up shaping the future of energy retail. Its mission is to empower enterprises to unlock the power of their data, with data-driven pricing, forecasting, and reporting solutions that streamline operations and lower risk. With a cloud-based engine and ground-breaking modeling software, Gorilla automates the process of data collection, transformation, processing, and analysis.

The goal of this feature was to empower and enable our users to control and manipulate the processes in their Gorilla setup. Automations allow users to set repetitive or one-time flows and tailor the platform to work according to their needs.

In-app automation/orchestration configuration will provide a way to chain actions after each other and make decisions based on the result of the previous one.

Successfully created a user-friendly interface for a complex feature.

Delivered prototypes of major flows for internal and external testing.

Prepared and facilitated usability testing internally and with users from the client side.

Collaborated with product and industry experts and engineers to define feature functionality and plan its execution.

The main challenge we faced was understanding the technical limitations, feasibility, and which automation configurations were possible. To overcome this challenge, software, back-end, front-end engineers and solution architects were involved in the process from the beginning.

We used Agile product development and design thinking methodologies to ensure that we were solving a genuine problem for users. The designs went through 6 iterations and the development was split into 2 stages: 1 - implement "read only" mode of the feature, 2 - add the functionality flows.

Practices that were involved during the feature definition stage:

Flowcharts

Reference research

Sketching

Backend definition workshops

High fidelity designs

Design reviews and feedback sessions with Front End and QA teams.

Clients' and users' opinion The feature had been introduced to our clients before development started to see if it sparks interest or concerns

Creation of prototypes

Usability testing

The feature was well accepted and spiked users' enthusiasm. However, despite all the efforts put into the definition, the work wasn't executed as a continuous flow as we had hickups along the way. During the development phase, we faced technical difficulties with API and back-end. In addition, we had to be flexible in ways of developing some elements in the front end.

I learned that collaborative work that involves people of different backgrounds and expertise, leads to a better understanding of the scope of the product and makes sure all sides of the project are taken care of. However, complex features like this might need more time to define the technical part and possibly do POCs both in the back end and front end.