Outreach Grid

  • COMPANY

    Outreach Grid

  • ROLE

    Project Manager

  • AREAS

    Management, service design, system optimization

  • MANAGEMENT FRAMEWORKS

    Agile, scrum, lean project management, design sprints

Summary

Outreach Grid is a powerful Coordinated Entry System for agencies, cities, and counties to understand and end homelessness. As project manager, I transformed internal systems and management tools to support the doubling of team size and the company shift to mid-growth. 

Transforming internal systems and tooling 

Audit

One of my first actions at Outreach Grid was to conduct research to understand existing internal tools and systems, and working styles. I ran individual time audits and group exercises to identify areas for improvement.

Through this analysis I identified 3 primary areas of improvement

  1. Individual time management 

  2. Task management and progress tracking systems

  3. Product development process 

Key questions 

  • Systems and tools

    • How are current tools being used and why?

    • What are current bottlenecks in internal systems (esp. product development) and why?

    • Where is the team doing repetitive and/or time-consuming work that could be automated or made more efficient using AI? 

  • Individual working styles 

    • How does each team member work? How does each team member manage their time?

Improving task management

Among other interventions, one of our  primary initiatives was to redevelop our system for receiving and tracking product requests and bugs, as well as how it was integrated into team workflows. 

TAR system improvements

User Research

UI Audit

Improving the product development process

My primary strategies were: first to make sure we were accurately analyzing the desirability, feasibility, and viability of improvements and new products and features, and second to incorporate improved user research practices into our processes in order to better make decisions about products. 

Implementing the DVF framework

We implemented a decision-making protocol for developing new products and features that focused on deeply understanding the purpose of the new product or feature, and aligning its scope with viability and feasibility. 

Integrating human centered design practices

In order to teach the team how to understand user experience and analyze the desirability of a product, I ran a workshop series on design thinking. The team enacted these learnings immediately in the development of two new features. 

Results

  • Increased on-time task completion by 45% in 10 months

  • Reduced a 2 year project backlog by 15%

  • Decreased time spent on support requests by 10%