ATCO: Innovating Logistics for Defence
Development of a Logistique platform for the Canadian federal government that supports the Army internationally.
7 min read • 2021 - 2022 • ATCO.com
Spring into Action - Challenges
1. Challenge Statement
The Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces are looking for innovative approaches to optimize logistics planning for military missions. These solutions should enable accurate forecasting of future supply needs, address potential challenges in advance, and allow for real-time plan adjustments as unforeseen issues emerge.
2. Background and Context
Military missions depend on precise logistics, from deployment and sustainment to the return of personnel and equipment. Supply needs vary based on factors like operational tempo, weather, adversary tactics, and battlefield conditions, while supply chains face disruptions from terrain, transport limitations, infrastructure damage, and security threats.
Existing logistics planning relies on experience and basic software tools. The Canadian Armed Forces seek innovative solutions to improve planning, predict supply demands, and adapt in real time, ensuring efficient resource management and rapid response to unexpected challenges.
3. Desired Outcomes
Innovative research, tools, and technologies that address, but are not limited to, the following:
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Forecasting local and mission-wide supply needs weeks in advance and developing comprehensive logistics plans that account for the complexities of military supply chains, potential bottlenecks, and the entire journey from origin to an international forward-operating base.
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Identifying the most efficient logistics solutions using available data and different optimization metrics (e.g., fastest delivery, lowest resource consumption).
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Conducting “what-if” analyses to assess the impact of real-world challenges such as transportation constraints, adverse weather, and enemy actions.
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Generating logistics reports and visualizing dynamic, complex supply chain information.
Project Intro
Working for ATCO has been challenging because the digital team is very young, and my role there required me to educate the business on the value of a great user experience.
One of the most complex projects I have undertaken for ATCO was the development of a Logistique platform for the Canadian federal government that supports the Army internationally.
The project was divided into two phases.
Initially, we had to create a Proof of Concept (POC) of the solution we were offering the army. This included creating a rugged interface for soldiers on the ground to order supplies and using blockchain to pre-populate data based on inputs.
Phase two consisted mainly of developing the app itself.
Our initial scoop and solution included two main features that would address their current pain points, but as we went through the project, we realized that we had to include 2 more personas as well as incorporate their flow into our proposal.
Thankfully we were able to contact a soldier on the ground who explained the team's process so we could identify the pain points and adjust the workflow.
The project consists of a single platform with three different flows.
Imagine a house with three doors, each one leading to a different area of the house. Each person experiences something different, but all of them are related to the same house.
As of now, this project has an extremely complex flow due to a very strict approval system used by the military.
User Flow
The creation of the user flow for each of our three personas.
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Soldier on the field
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Drop-point guy
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Logistic planner
Development Challenges
Due to two specific factors, the project has been extremely complicated.
1. The complexity of understanding the "Army jargon" since they mainly speak in "codes".
Halfway through our first milestone, we realized we weren't entirely on track since we missed key information because of a lack of communication with our soldiers on the field.
During this project, we conducted many interviews, but our first few weeks have been more challenging.
Several weeks into the project, we decided to hire a soldier on the ground to work closely with us on the project to better understand their flow and pain points, and to make sense of their jargon when it didn't make sense to us.
We were fortunate enough to have our soldier picture us their works comparing our platform and flow with those of Costco, that was a very smart move on his part, that helped us finalize the project.
2. Timelines.
Because of the high expectations and main requirements for the Federal Government,
We were subjected to very strict deadlines from the federal government.
Our team had only six months to bring a concept to life, including the use of AI technology and blockchain technology.
The challenge made us work harder and more effectively as a team.
In our workflow, sprints, working in an agile environment, creating roadmaps, and weekly meetings were essential
Identify and define user stories
As the first step in this project, I created our "user stories", which were concise descriptions of the features and functionalities written from the perspective of our users. Having completed my stories, I created our user flow in collaboration with the team and our soldiers on the ground. We were able to determine the business and our end-users perspective, identify our users' needs and understand how our visitors would navigate through the platform.
User stories:
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As a logistics planner at the brigade and division levels, I want to create a baseline logistic plan automatically based on the threat identified so that I can respond quickly.
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As a logistics planner at the brigade and division levels, I want automatically adjust the supplies required by location and environmental factors so I know what supplies to mobilize to that threat.
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As a logistic planner at the brigade and division levels, I want to identify the location of the supplies required so that I can begin to mobilize equipment to the threat location quickly.
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As a logistic planner at the brigade and division levels, I want to visualize and share complex logistic information, so that we can make more informed decisions.
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As a logistics planner at the battalion (QM or CQMS) level, I want to confirm demand and supply inventory levels difitally (rugged view) in the field, so that logistics plannners at the brigade and division levels can fulfill orders quickly and monitor inventory levels.
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Blockchain: As a logistic planner at the brigade and division levels, I want to know where supplies are and who was involved in approving, delivering and accepting delivered supplies, so that I have better records and added assurance of supply inventory.
*A preview of my wireframes is shown below - low and high fidelity
Supplies and Operations
For a logistician, a key aspect of their role is tracking supplies by connecting orders to the operation.
A logistic planner will be responsible for setting up the pick-up/delivery location. Soldiers on the field at the brigade level do not need to define it for each order since it would always be the same.
What is included in an order?
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A link directing the user to a modal window that provides information about the person who created this specific order, who updated it last, and when it was updated.
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A comment section for every order and each operation so all types of users can stay connected and stay up to date about any concerns or changes.
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Orders status.
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Supply type.
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The ability for a user to auto-resupply an order.
Operation Creation
As a logistic planner while creating an operation I will have access to 4 different tabs:
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Operation: Basic information such as the disaster location and date, the duration of the operation, and the personnel involved.
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Details: Additional information that will include our AI technology, our ability to pre-populate data based on inputs, and information about life support.
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Demands: Ordering supplies.
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Analysis: Data prediction based on the previous inputs.
*A preview of the final Designs is shown below
Wireframes to Final Design
In my first wireframing step, I used paper wireframes for low fidelity designs; this allowed us to visualize a variety of concepts, as well as define and plan our information hierarchy.
I then created higher fidelity digital wireframes using Figma and prototyped those in order to be able to run usability tests and improve our experience before moving onto the final design step and the creation of our design system.
Initially, I designed a prototype that would be presented to the government in our POC presentation, but then we were only asked to share a report with them.
Our team tried to think of how we can present our project in a unique way and maybe add something extra to the report, so I created a 2-minute video featuring our prototype and voice hover to demonstrate our idea more clearly.
This video has been created using After-effects and Rotato for a realistic simulation of our app on desktop and mobile devices using 3D animations.
This project was designed following IDES - ATCO Design System which I have created as-well.