Improving User Experience in ERP Form Design

🪜 Designing Better Progress Steps UX. With practical techniques to help people navigate and complete complex forms with or without progress steps ↓ ✅ Progress steps break a long form into small, manageable parts. ✅ They show where users are and how much they have left to go. 🤔 But: they are often overlooked and don’t scale well on mobile. 🤔 Difficult to design for dynamic flows with conditional sections. ✅ For simple forms, always start without a progress indicator. ✅ Tell users what they need and how much time it will take. ✅ Show progress as “Step [X] out of [Y]” with a text label. ✅ Add a drop-down to support quick jumps between steps. 🚫 For complex forms, don’t rely on visual progress bar alone. ✅ Always include text labels under each step for easy, precise jumps. ✅ Underline labels to make it clear that users can use them to navigate. ✅ Design 6 states: incomplete, active, complete, error, disabled, warning. 🤔 You can rarely display 5+ progress steps on mobile. ✅ Keep active label visible but hide future and past steps. ✅ Show a Back link on the top, Next button at the bottom. ✅ For long forms, repeat the Back link at the bottom, too. ✅ On desktop, vertical progress steps often work better. ✅ Set up an overview page with links to single steps (“task list”). ✅ Allow users to expand and collapse all steps and sub-steps. ✅ Don’t forget to highlight error status in the progress step. Only few things are more frustrating than a progress bar that seems to be stuck. Complex forms often have conditional sections, so users end up going in circles, staying on the same step as they move between sections. It’s a common problem with horizontal layout, and a common reason why people leave. With a vertical layout, we can always show all sections with all sub-steps, explaining to users where they are and what’s coming up next. We can expand and collapse some steps and support fast navigation and quick jumps. We can also highlight all errors or missing data and explain what’s actually missing. A few smaller pages usually perform better than one long page. One column layout usually causes fewer errors as multi-column layout. Give users one column with vertical progress steps, and you might be surprised how much faster they get through the entire form, despite its complexity and length. Useful resources: Stepped Progression, by Goldman Sachs https://lnkd.in/eHbB5EFu Multi-Step Wizard, by GE HealthCare https://lnkd.in/ezA__z_E Task List Pattern, by Gov.uk https://lnkd.in/eb3PzTEJ Form Design: From Zero to Hero, by Adam Silver https://lnkd.in/eTBQxBXg Wizards Design Recommendations, by Raluca Budiu https://lnkd.in/eYYxUUDM Loading And Progress Indicators, by Taras Bakusevych https://lnkd.in/e5KFPiiq #ux #design

Do you think the UI of D365 F&O is chaotic? Guess what - an ERP is not designed to be user friendly, it's designed to be robust! The bigger the ERP, the more true you will find this to be. Why? Because: - UI improvements don't sell well unless the buyer is the end user (and it's not, it's the board, often on a purely economical basis). - Keep adding more and more features (and any application will reach that point given enough time) and you will find it impossible to have a slick UI. - Flexibility often comes at the cost of intuitive design. It's challenging to build for both great user experience AND maximum customisation in a complex business application like an ERP. Ah, but now I hear you say: “Ok, this doesn’t solve our problems though. Our users find the system chaotic and our productivity goes down.” Ok, let’s handle it then. This is how you can really improve your users' experience with D365 F&O: 1. Tailor security access: Streamline user interfaces by showing only what's necessary. Properly configured security roles can significantly declutter screens and simplify navigation. 2. Design smart customisations: Avoid designing overly convoluted features that add too many buttons and forms. Less is more, also in software design. 3. Train users: Teach users how to navigate D365 F&O and how to personalise forms to their needs. Use saved views to speed up filtering and display of relevant information. 4. Leverage PowerApps: Create user-friendly interfaces for specific tasks or roles (e.g. data input). PowerApps can provide a more intuitive front-end while still leveraging D365 F&O's robust back-end capabilities. 5. Leverage reporting: Build targeted workspaces dashboards that give users quick access to the information they need. This reduces the need for complex navigation within the system. Remember that improving user experience in D365 F&O isn't about making it look pretty. It's about making it work efficiently for your specific business needs. So empower your users to make the most of the standard D365 F&O capabilities - they’re often underestimated. Use the advice above to create a more intuitive, productive environment for your users without compromising on the system's robustness.

5 Common UX Mistakes in Form Design (And How to Fix Them) Let’s face it—filling out forms isn’t anyone’s favorite task. But the way we design forms can make a huge difference in the user experience. Here are five of the most common form design mistakes and how to avoid them: 1. Overwhelming users with too many fields Solution: Group related fields, keep it concise, and only ask for essential info. 2. Using a single lengthy form Solution: Break forms into digestible sections. Multistep forms can reduce the “intimidation factor.” 3. Poor error handling and validation Solution: Show clear, actionable error messages. Let users know exactly what went wrong and how to fix it. 4. Omitting labels from form input fields Solution: Use clear, visible labels—especially on mobile. Place them above or inside fields to keep forms accessible. 5. Not designing for mobile Solution: Ensure your form is mobile-friendly with larger touch targets and a responsive layout. 🚀 Improving your form design doesn’t just help the user; it drives higher completion rates and better conversions. Avoid these pitfalls, and watch your UX transform! P.S. Which of these mistakes have you noticed the most? Or do you think I've missed anything more? #ux #ui #forms