TrueNorth Operations Software
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TrueNorth is a transportation logistics startup that empowers independent truck drivers to find, book, and manage their loads.
Rebuilding TrueNorth’s Fleet Management Tool
Originally envisioned as a fleet management tool for TrueNorth’s own fleet of trucks, the software’s function needed to completely change when the company pivoted to providing support and services for independent carriers. While a few features remained unchanged, we discovered the need for an entirely new set of features to create and manage “setups”—the legal relationship between independent carriers and brokers, which is required before a load can be done.
Creating a setup is a time-consuming process, often done under a tight deadline. TrueNorth offered this service as a way to attract and keep carriers and had a dedicated operational team whose only focus was creating setups. The team used a variety of 3rd party software which was expensive, and worse, caused important data to be scattered between systems.
Project Goals
Make our tool the source of truth for carrier and broker data and relationships
Eliminate dependency on outside tools
Reduce time to create setups
Provide visibility into load frequency and revenue
Prepare for carriers to become self-service
Challenges
Since TrueNorth was transitioning from one business model to another, the solution had to support two different types of fleets and account for their unique requirements
New fields used the design system while existing ones did not, resulting in a UI mix where I continuously influenced engineering toward UI consistency
We unexpectedly uncovered inconsistencies between screens and in the database, from one entity to another and from editable to display
Designs
These are some screens for the carrier (trucking company) side of the software. There is a complementary workflow for the broker side.
Before my work, it was impossible to see any load information at the carrier level, broker/carrier relationships did not exist in the product, and pages did not relate or link to each other.
Carrier List: The carriers contracted with TrueNorth. Users can see carriers’ status, activity, and revenue.
Carrier Details: General business information for each carrier. The high-level load information remains constant on all tabs.
Loads: Review all loads a carrier has done and see if TrueNorth has been paid by the broker.
Broker Relationships: It’s easy to see if a carrier has an established relationship with a broker, required before a carrier can book a load with a broker, and to add one if they don’t.
Outcomes
The Operations team was able to onboard carriers and brokers and create setups within the software, completely eliminating the need for 3rd party tools and reducing costs
Database changes, a direct effect of the design, resulted in a single source of truth and alignment across segments
Access can easily be controlled for self-service use by carriers