IBM Match 360 with Watson wins a 2021 Creative Communication Award
Leveraging customer data for business purposes has become essential in any industry. However, as data continues to be derived from an increasing number of sources, the ability to consolidate and analyze all your data has become harder to achieve. Our IBM Match 360 with Watson product team identified this issue, coming up with a cloud-native, machine learning-assisted solution. The product seamlessly consolidates data from unique sources and establishes a single 360-degree view of the customer.
I’m so thrilled to announce the design team has been awarded for their innovative work, receiving a 2021 Creative Communication Award in the User Interface Design / UI & UX Design category. Competing with applications from all over the world, IBM Match 360 with Watson was selected based on the jury’s criteria of creativity, excellence, and outstanding ideas in communication design. I’ve seen all the hard work this team has put into this product and I’m so glad they are receiving recognition for what they’ve created.
IBM Match 360 with Watson is optimized for self service while thriving in the cloud environment
A commitment to IBM’s Enterprise Design Thinking framework enabled the design team to work with our users and identify the biggest pain points in their workflow. Years of research, user testing, and product iterations led the team to understand the need for self service and integration capabilities in the cloud environment. As companies shift their work to the cloud, they need their data processing capabilities to shift with them seamlessly. Customers wanted the ability to set up the product in-house without the need for a technical expert also to utilize the benefits of related IBM products once they were onboarded.
Using these insights, the design team identified the key elements of IBM Master Data Management and modernized them for the cloud environment. They recognized that removing the reliance on highly specialized third parties to set up the product would be critical. IBM Match 360 with Watson eases this transition, removing any friction in the installment process using a simple and intuitive design. This improved user experience allows for a pain-free set up in the cloud, enabling users who traditionally would not have the deep technical knowledge of Master Data Management systems to do their own installment to get started within minutes.
The design team also wanted to elevate the tool by optimizing for integration with other products within the IBM Cloud Pak for Data platform. Thanks to its approachable interface, data professionals can integrate other products quickly and easily. This allows data professionals downstream to have access to all the same matched data which has been stored in IBM Match 360 with Watson, and decreases the time to value on projects aimed at extracting business insights to enable more rapid innovation.
The team’s dedication to extensive user research also uncovered the need for a more robust view of customer data — one which would allow users to analyze information from multiple sources and match their data so they could deliver better business insights. The design team created a solution which achieves this, using an intelligent data matching algorithm to sort and process thousands of attributes from separate sources into one 360-view.
A clear dashboard allows users to explore, compare, and analyze the resulting data entities easily. Extensive user testing led to a design which makes understanding the sources, distribution, and breakdown of their matched data simple and efficient. Data professionals can now analyze their information faster and feel more confident in their recommendations based on these better insights.
I’m so proud of the way this team remained committed to our user throughout the design and development process. Their dedication to finding the best possible solution has created an exceptional user experience, and I’m so glad they are receiving recognition for this award. Congratulations to the winning team.
Winning Design Team
John Bailey, Amanda Pasquali, Diana Levan, Dominick Washburn, Ivy Li, Jose Banuelos, Lauren Chen, Michael Yee, Phil Brucker, Rachna Tiwary, Tobias Albrecht
Arin Bhowmick (@arinbhowmick) is Vice President and Chief Design Officer, IBM Software Products, based in San Francisco, California. The above article is personal and does not necessarily represent IBM’s positions, strategies or opinions.
