Community Emergency Response Team

A mobile app for disaster preparedness

CERT was created in 1987 by the Los Angeles Fire Department, and later adopted nationwide in 1993 by FEMA. It is a program designed for civilians to learn the necessary skills to help assist in disaster situations. Members of cert must undergo an intensive where they will lean search and rescue, triage, cribbing, victim designation, light medical application, and more. Once they are ready, they complete a final exam which consist of both a written, and physical test under duress.

While CERT continues to be largely successful across the nation, there are large areas for improvement, one of those being team accountability, and communication in the field. As it stands current Field Ops team can only communicate with each other, and their respective ICC (Incident Command Centers) via a cell phone call, or radio. Through extensive research and first hand account as a previous member, I have found that accountability, efficiency and awareness are large pain points that are derivative from this.

The Problem

Field Ops have limited ways of communicating with other team members and their HQ. This goes for checking in, reports on tasks, referencing field guides, and more. This creates a lack of efficiency, and adds risk to a already dangerous situations.
ICC has very limited ties to their teams in the field. With the exception of cell phones, and CB radios, they have no other way to keep tabs, assign tasks, or inform their teams.

The Proposal

Further understand what duties CERT members can and will perform once deployed.
Gain insight on pain points for teams and the ICC regarding communication dynamics.
Obtain deeper knowledge on the inner workings of a disaster setting, and how that impacts civilians, as well as CERT members.

The Solution

Devise a mobile app for CERT members that is specifically designed for emergency situations. This app should be used in training sessions as well, and could be later implemented the main digital tool for CERT members nationwide.

Tools/Methods

Deep Dive / Competitive / Audit Secondary / ResearchDirected / Storytelling Prototype Walkthrough Survey / Remote Usability Testing

Keynote Proposal

Research

As a previous member of CERT I knew a problem space existed with communication while in the field. However, as a designer it was my job to make sure I gave myself enough distance from assumptions, so I could conduct research which was difficult, but ultimately enlightening.

In order to fully encompass that notion I performed a deep dive into CERT, and similar programs to gain an understanding of what duties they perform, what techniques are used, the mechanics behind those techniques, why those made it to the FEMA approved field guide, and the different scenarios in which they could be used.

Ideate

After conducting several interviews I started to sketch out what the app would look like. This must include two sides, a field op facing and an ICC facing side. This way during an emergency both can communicate effectively, and have that accountability they are both looking to improve upon.

Creating the sketches was a challenge since there was so much at account for that would need to take place during an emergency, not least of all human reactions. Each choice on the screen needed pin point accuracy, and clarity for the user who is under extreme duress during a criss will need to know exactly what step they were taking when navigating through the app.

Usability Testing

Once I established who my user group was, I needed to know just what was important to them during an actual emergency event. I sent out an interactive prototype survey asking open ended questions such as which features they thought might be used in an emergency, which features they would prioritize, and above all else why?

While research was being conducted, and low fidelity prototypes were underway, several UX experts were called in to critique the project.

Survey — Through several methods of research, patterns began to develop.

“Before anything else, preparation is the key to success.”

— Alexander Grahm Bell

The next step was to wireframe out the project. This would allow me to ideate each screen, of which there would be many that needed updates and changes as I started to apply user goals, hierarchy, and general IA to the flows.

Presentation

The actual presentation was limited to under 5minutes, so a few key features had to be left out in the walkthrough, but what was shown embodied the core functionality behind an app that would be used by Field Ops, and the ICC alike.