ADP Enterprise Support

While leading the Innovation Group at IBM/Neudesic, we identified a critical opportunity in enterprise support transformation. Our client ADP, along with several other enterprise clients, was struggling with fragmented knowledge management.

Role

Product Design Director

Team Size Managed

4 Designers + 1 Research

Duration

1 month

Initial observations showed:

support teams spending excessive time navigating multiple knowledge bases and switching between client contexts.

Primary Research:

Conducted in-depth interviews with 45 support agents across 3 enterprise clients
Shadowed 12 senior support engineers for 2 weeks
Analyzed 50,000+ support tickets from the past 18 months
Ran 5 workshops with support team leaders and knowledge base managers

Key Findings:

Agents spent 37% of their time searching through knowledge bases
Context switching between clients took 12 minutes on average
42% of escalations were due to incomplete or outdated knowledge base information
28% of support tickets required consulting multiple knowledge sources

User Pain Points:

Mental fatigue from constant context switching
Difficulty maintaining compliance across different client environments
Time lost to manual document processing
Frustration with disconnected knowledge systems

Challenge

The core problem was three-fold: • Support teams needed to maintain strict data separation while efficiently switching between client contexts • Knowledge was fragmented across multiple enterprise systems (SharePoint, wikis, documentation) • Manual document processing was creating significant bottlenecks in support resolution

Initial observations showed:

support teams spending excessive time navigating multiple knowledge bases and switching between client contexts.

Primary Research:

Conducted in-depth interviews with 45 support agents across 3 enterprise clients
Shadowed 12 senior support engineers for 2 weeks
Analyzed 50,000+ support tickets from the past 18 months
Ran 5 workshops with support team leaders and knowledge base managers

Key Findings:

Agents spent 37% of their time searching through knowledge bases
Context switching between clients took 12 minutes on average
42% of escalations were due to incomplete or outdated knowledge base information
28% of support tickets required consulting multiple knowledge sources

User Pain Points:

Mental fatigue from constant context switching
Difficulty maintaining compliance across different client environments
Time lost to manual document processing
Frustration with disconnected knowledge systems

Challenge

Design Strategy

Our solution centered on a context-aware support system built on three key pillars:

Knowledge Integration Layer

Unified access to all knowledge sources while maintaining strict client data separation
Real-time document processing and integration
Automated context switching between client environments

Context Management System Created distinct "mental models" for each client company, handling:

Company-specific terminology
Compliance rules
Knowledge structure
Security protocols

User Interface Developed a clean, intuitive interface that:

Provided clear visual context indicators
Showed explicit progress tracking for document processing
Maintained consistent navigation patterns

Implementation

We rolled out the system in phases:

Initial pilot with ADP's support team
Core knowledge integration and context management
Document processing capabilities
Enhanced search and navigation features
Scaled deployment to other enterprise clients

Impact

Quantitative Results:

73% reduction in agent search time
89% accuracy in context switching
65% reduction in document processing time
4.8/5 agent satisfaction score

Qualitative Improvements:

Increased agent confidence in responses
Reduced cognitive load during client switches
Higher team morale and job satisfaction
More time for complex problem-solving

Key Learnings

Visual Context is Critical Clear visual indicators for client context proved essential for preventing errors and building agent confidence.
Progress Transparency Explicit progress tracking for document processing reduced agent anxiety and improved workflow management.
Version Control Importance Knowledge base versioning became a crucial factor in maintaining accuracy and compliance.

Reflection

This innovation project succeeded because we deeply understood the human element of enterprise support work while solving complex technical challenges. The most valuable insight wasn't technical

… it was understanding that great support tools should feel invisible.