Internship at Newgen Software

Overview

The COVID-19 not only forced everyone to stay at home, but it also prevented many students and scholars from participating in experiential learning opportunities. After hundreds of applications, dozens of rejections, and one offer, I was able to secure an internship as a UX Design Intern at Newgen.

Interview

The internship began in December 2020 and will last for three months (till March 2021). Following a brief introduction with the team and reporting manager, I was given a tour of the various tools available and how to operate with them.

I completed two major projects during the internship:

• Understanding the WCAG 3.0 Draft, comparing it to WCAG 2.2, its implementation, testing tools, and industry online usability practises.
  Usability Analysis & Screen U.I Designs
• Analyzing the usability of a web-based application and designing some U.I screens for it.

Mentors

The UX Lead, who also functioned as my reporting manager, and the Software Design Engineer, who acted as my secondary mentor and reporting manager, oversaw the most of my internship experience.

The Team

The team to which I was assigned was called “Genesis.”
It had around 20 individuals with a range of backgrounds, including Software Engineers, Analysts, and Information Technology Engineers, to name a few.

My Role

In the first project, I was responsible for conducting research on digital usability and accessibility, specifically the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) version 3.0, and presenting the results to the Design Team in order to help them understand usability and the guidelines that should be followed in a digital product to accommodate people with disabilities.

For my second project, I was charged with designing different-sized splash screens for Corrus, a company-wide job management tool.
In addition to the Screens, I completed a Usability Analysis of the app, outlining key concerns that a user could face.

1st Project: WCAG

Starting with the first task, I began my online research by learning about the World Wide Web Consortium’s Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) and comparing WCAG 2.2 to the latest draught of WCAG 3.0.
Implementation, requirements, and tools were all part of the process, which included learning about WCAG, Principles of Ergonomics, and Usability through YouTube videos and other resources (such as the W3C website).

Secondary Research

I began by performing secondary research utilising tools and information available on the Internet. WCAG 3.0 (Web Content Accessibility Rules 3.0) is a set of guidelines for making web content more accessible to people with a variety of disabilities. It’s comprehensive, but also quite thorough, making it difficult to understand fast. Static content, interactive content, visual and audio media, virtual and augmented reality, and other types of internet content are all handled by them. The recommendations cover user agents (browsers and assistive technologies), content management systems, writing tools, and testing tools.

What’s New in 3.0

• Support for those with a wider range of impairments.
• Guidelines for mobile and desktop apps are included.
• It has a new scoring system. Your website or product no longer needs to meet 100 percent of the requirements as long as it is accessible to individuals with impairments.

Structure of Guidelines

Guidelines: solutions to accessibility problems.

Outcomes: the desired result (or “outcome”) of reducing accessibility problems. This is what we test usability for.

Methods: detailed ways and tests for rating how well your project meets an outcome.

Key Highlights of 1st Project

• WCAG 3.0
• Comparison between 2.0 vs 3.0
• New Changes & Classifications.
• Implementations
• Tools & Applications

2nd Project: Corrus

Corrus is a project and task management platform that enables project and task teams to collaborate and achieve their objectives. The application may be used to define processes, objectives, and tasks, among other things.

Key Highlights of 2nd Project-

• In the Corrus application, issues such as usability and aesthetics were found.
• The applications’ splash screens and logos were created.
• The team was shown the overall analysis presentation.

Tools Used

While the majority of the team works using Adobe XD, I used FIGMA for my designs and presentation showcase.

Internship Experience

At Newgen, I experienced a steep and thrilling learning curve.
My internship was virtual due to the Pandemic, yet I never felt isolated from the Newgen Team and Mentors.
I felt incredibly welcomed and loved by the team, from daily meetings to live feedback sessions and group discussions. I didn’t feel like I was simply an intern, but a member of the team.

The most important takeaway from the internship was that I gained hands-on experience working in a B2B software company, which differs from a B2C software/application company in that there is a greater emphasis on research before design and precision during design, as well as designing for a broader target group.

Conclusion

While testing with various tools, the internship helped me learn more about WCAG, Usability, Accessibility, and implementations of design improvements.
The experience gave me a clearer and more in-depth understanding of design in an industry where function always takes precedence over form.