Outcomes: I worked closely with the Head of Product and Product Owners to prioritise farmer-loved features and ensure delivery in the right order. As the design led, I guided all mobile deliverables, mentored my team, and contributed hands-on.
To achieve these outcomes, I introduced a design discovery matrix, streamlined collaboration, enhanced our research toolkit, and aligned cross-functional teams for efficiency. I also improved our customer feedback loop by implementing an in-product survey tool, delivering actionable insights for post-release enhancements.
Helping farmers make fast decisions in the field
Recording Health Treatments offline
The Problem
A farmer’s work revolves around being outdoors—making decisions, implementing plans, and managing their land, animals, and sometimes staff to achieve the best outcomes. Farming is inherently hands-on and labour-intensive, yet FarmIQ lacked a solution that truly supported farmers in their day-to-day environment.
Our previous mobile application was outdated, sluggish, and difficult to use, leading to significant frustration. As a result, many farmers reverted to recording information on paper while in the paddock, only to face the tedious task of re-entering this data into our web application at the end of their long working day.
The Challenge
Before my time at FarmIQ, the team engaged upfront with farmers in exploratory research, immersing themselves in their environments by hosting workshops in woodsheds, attending national field days, and frequently visiting farms for interviews, user testing, and observations. This in-depth research highlighted that the IQ app needed to function offline first, to cater for a high-percentage of our farms dealing with patchy internet.
Farm life is focused around land, so that mental model needed to be applied to the app, recording from the map made recording in the IQ feel easy. We also needed to cater for dirty hands, harsh weather conditions, poor light and accessibile colour contrast. The app's core purpose is to allow fast and easy offline recording, management of pasture and livestock, and provide insights to help with everyday decision-making.
When I started at FarmIQ the app had offline capability and farmers could see their stock on the map and stock list.
When I joined FIQ, the IQ app only had a basic mob move record.
When I left FIQ, the IQ app had 11 new recordings, full Tasks and Diary features, and app notifications, among other enhancements.
The Process: Continually Understanding What Our Customers Want
Life on a farm can change rapidly due to many factors beyond our customers’ control—weather, the economy, compliance requirements, mobile reception, and the other software they use, to name a few. This makes it crucial for us to understand what our customers truly want, not just assume, and to recognise that their needs can shift from month to month.
As the voice of our customers, especially when the team’s focus can lean heavily towards developers and testers, we must maintain a clear understanding of our customers’ priorities and ensure these shape the direction of our work.
Because of this, every project we undertook included at least one research initiative to validate our solutions. We also actively seek feedback from farmers to uncover the next pressing problem they want us to tackle.
For an in-depth look at how we connect with FarmIQ customers, click here
Farmers are loyal to the job they need to get done, not the solution. Managing life on farm is our customers core jobs-to-be-done.
The New Challenge for Design: Updating the Discovery Process
When I joined, the team used detailed research for each project, but the shift to agile delivery required a new approach to balance in-depth research with fast-paced sprints. The design team needed to deliver validated solutions quickly, without cutting back on research.
I led a review of the Discovery process to create a scalable research approach that aligned with agile methodology. Collaborating with our Agile Coach, we facilitated a workshop with stakeholders, documenting and streamlining the process. As Design Lead, I ensured the new process was both efficient and effective.
The original Discovery Process was long-winded and complex
Introducing the Design Discovery Template, Matrix and Toolkit
Recognising that each project varies in complexity and uncertainty, I developed a Design Discovery Matrix to guide our design team and POs in determining the right level of research, design, and usability testing needed. This ensures we allocate resources efficiently and deliver the best possible outcomes for our farmers.
These guidelines are flexible, as not every project follows the same process. I shared the matrix with the design team, and together we built a research toolkit tailored to different challenges. This approach encouraged creative, adaptable research methods.
I also created a Figma template to standardise the initial steps of understanding farmers' problems and updated the discovery process to clarify Product Owners’ responsibilities. Regular meetings with the Head of Product and Product Owners helped me plan my team’s workload, ensuring alignment and capacity for success. For larger projects, I collaborate with another designer; for smaller ones, I scope and assign tasks to a single designer.
Planning the product design capacity
The value we are ready to deliver to our farmers uncovered in Discovery - a new metric for success
Company-wide update on our Discovery process at Seasonal Planning
Highlighting areas where design needs support, given the faster pace of delivery
Prioritising Delivery with Farmers’ Needs First
Our Head of Product had a clear vision for how the mobile app could achieve its full potential. Collaborating with the Mobile App Junior Product Owner, I facilitated stakeholder workshops with shareholders and B2B contacts. These sessions were instrumental in sharing customer feedback, aligning on priorities, and addressing both farmer and B2B needs to drive impactful deliverables.
As Design Lead, a key aspect of my role was presenting customer insights to the Head of Product and Product Owners. This completed the feedback loop, allowing us to balance farmer value with technical feasibility. Together, we regularly prioritised t-shirt-sized features using frameworks like MoSCoW and the Impact vs. Effort Matrix, ensuring a well-rounded and strategic approach to delivery.
Retiring the classic app (far right) meant everything farmers need must move to IQ app (middle)
IQ app priorities set with a MoSCoW and Impact vs. Effort Matrix
Designing Solutions: Fast Recording from the Map
With these new processes, the design team prioritised enabling farmers to record quickly and easily within the app, giving them much-needed peace of mind by reducing the mental load of remembering details amidst their busy schedules. Through continued research, we uncovered that this functionality represents the highest value of the IQ app.
To ensure recording on the IQ resonated with real-world farming needs, the team thoroughly explored the context of life on a variety of farms (following the Discovery process), adhering to our principle, "Built for farm life." For example, we learnt that farmers recording a sale in IQ are often in the yard while stock is loaded onto trucks. At this point, they are unlikely to have access to complete information, and a fast recording time becomes essential amidst competing demands. Similarly, when recording a death, farmers are likely to be out in the paddock or at the offal pit, often outside network coverage, making offline capability vital.
For efficiency, consistency, and best practice, we refined recording patterns for both the map and stock list views, documenting these in our design libraries. Components were enhanced as new use cases arose, ensuring workflows remained consistent and intuitive. This approach empowered farmers to continue recording at speed, in line with our principles, "Every Second Counts" and "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle."
Map-based stock features include: Drafts, Health Treatments, Deaths (Killed on farm, Loss), Sales, Weights, Purchases, and Notes.
Map-based land features include: Pasture covers, Chemical applications, Fertiliser applications, and Notes.
Recording drafting (sorting/separating livestock) on farm.
Recording Health Treatments using products and batches for compliance
Recording deaths, including on-farm killings and losses, helps farmers keep their stock reconciliation up to date.
Recording chemical applications in real-time ensures no stock graze on fields in a withholding period, keeping both livestock safe and the farm compliant.
Designing Solutions: Rewarding Effort with Valuable Data
The second largest value of the IQ app is enabling our manager roles to make quick decisions when out in the field. This evolved into the Diary feature where all recorded information on farm is visible to all staff. Here we reward our farmers for inputting the information into our app by showing them useful data in the diary so they can make immediate management decisions. View more in-depth information on my Diary case study
The mob and paddock summaries in the IQ app are great examples of rewarding farmers for their efforts in recording data. These pages highlight the key information farmers need while out in the field, such as stock movements, weights, health treatments, sales, and purchases—insights gathered from farmer interviews. When there is no data to show, we use empty states to encourage farmers to record the necessary information. to gain the value.
Designing Solutions: Delegating Work for Peace of Mind
Our tasks system empowers farmers to delegate work efficiently, providing peace of mind in managing the constant demands of farm life. Through continuous research, we identified that roles such as Owner-Operator, Farm Manager, and Stock Manager often face a never-ending list of tasks. Some carry hard deadlines, such as compliance requirements, while others, like fixing a fence, are more flexible and ongoing.
Tasks have become a core feature of our farm management system, enabling farmers to manage both staff and the essential work required to keep their farms running smoothly. Our initial focus was on creating an intuitive experience for Workers and Stock Managers to view and complete general tasks. Based on feedback, we then enhanced this experience, enabling the creation and editing of tasks. Farmers found it logical to integrate these tasks into the IQ app, assigning them to the appropriate staff members who receive in-app notifications as reminders for seamless completion.
Given the diverse nature of farm work, the tasks system is highly flexible, accommodating recurring jobs, start-and-stop tasks, and specific requirements. One of the most impactful features we delivered was the ability to add a location to a task. This simple addition eliminated the need for time-consuming back-and-forth communication, such as clarifying where a break fence needs to be installed.
By addressing the complexities of farm work and streamlining delegation, we’ve reinforced our commitment to delivering solutions that truly support farmers’ needs.
Building on Mobile App Success with In-Product Feedback
As Lead Product Designer, I describe a designers roles as wearing four hats:
1. Looking Ahead: Develop a high-level vision and keep the team updated on industry trends and competitors.
2. Discovering: Understand customer problems by emphasising, gather input from internal staff and customers, design solutions, and test them iteratively.
3. Design Support: Ensure designs are implemented correctly, providing design QA and UX advice to the Scrum Team.
4. Building on Releases: Evaluate product releases, document feedback, and incorporate insights into the discovery process.
Recognising the lack of structured feedback, I identified an opportunity to improve collaboration and how we collected feedback as part of my Women & Leadership New Zealand: Leading Edge 6-month course.
Our product designers' hats we wear throughout our work cycle.
All internal stakeholders involved in this company-wide process change.
Understanding Current Customer Feedback
I worked with key stakeholders—Customer Support, Ops, Marketing, and Product Owners—to review our feedback process. While MixPanel provided usage data, it lacked context on customer motivations. At the time, most feedback came from Farm Owners, Operators, and Managers, with only 8.5% from mobile app users. This revealed a significant gap in feedback from roles like Stock Managers and Workers. Since the mobile app is our flagship product, its success depends on gathering and acting on feedback from all user roles.
Our customers' enhancement requests mostly come from Farm Owners/Managers and web users.
We excelled at tracking our usage data, but we lacked ongoing qualitative feedback.
Implementing Survicate In-Product Surveys: A Game-Changer
I introduced Survicate to gather instant, actionable feedback post-feature release. This provides us with both quantitative and qualitative data without costly one-on-one interviews. It offers us valuable insights with an impressive 75–80% survey completion rate across web and mobile apps and revealed an average Customer Satisfaction Score (CAST) of 80% for the current recording experience on mobile!
Surveys revealed feature-specific feedback, like diary improvements, and helped refine recordings like mob moves and treatments. They also reached hard-to-contact users, such as Workers, with ease.
Testing email surveys proved Survicate's value for beta testing, outperforming tools like Survey Monkey. Survicate is now a key part of our discovery process, delivering quick, reliable feedback to validate designs and hypotheses.
Highlight of some customer feedback we have gathered in the application has helped us quickly improve our solutions
Internal Success Results
We improved our Discovery process, developed a design matrix, expanded our research toolkit, and strengthened company alignment. In-product surveys provided actionable insights, demonstrating that limited resources can still drive impactful research.
Including CSAT surveys in our after-release process, has allowed us to measure our success not only by increased usage data but also by how our customers feel about the experience. The feedback we receive allows us to build on our releases and prioritise our roadmap. By enhancing our releases we are building trust with our customers and can easily track our company's progress on our long-term goals.
The Measure of Success
⬆️ IQ App Stickiness at 32.4%
FarmIQ's stickiness metric, tracks how often farmers return to the IQ app, has soared to 32.4%, a 17.45% increase year-over-year, far exceeding the 20% SaaS benchmark for exceptional engagement. The features released over the past 12 months contribute to this success, including Health Treatments, Deaths, Recording for the Essential Pack, Rainfall Data, Tasks, Health & Safety, Timesheets and Land applications. Alongside a steady migration of farmers from the Classic app, 38% of our customers regularly use the IQ app—just 4% below web.
This achievement highlights the impact of research, innovative solutions, and collaboration in enhancing the app’s usability and addressing user needs.
IQ stickness increased by 17.4% in 12 months.
Monthly active users: Web (FMS): 42%, IQ: 39%, Classic: 19%. A 13% increase on the IQ app in 12 months.
Our first IQ App feature release, Move Moves, achieved an impressive 97% of mobile users adopting the new app.
Our second IQ App feature, Health Treatments, has 61% of mobile users onboard. With upcoming validated enhancements in the backlog, we anticipate even greater adoption.
Work completed whilst at FarmIQ