Get the Lead Out
Introducing Get the Lead Out, a remarkable mobile app that allows conscious citizens to make a difference. With this user-friendly tool, individuals can investigate and report their water system's lead-pipe status guided by open-source census data estimates. By doing so, community leaders gain valuable insights into the estimated costs of replacing lead pipes, facilitating their efforts to secure lead-pipe-replacement funding under the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law’s funds under Lead Service Line Replacement initiative. Get the Lead Out is here to empower and educate communities, supporting community leaders in their pursuit of safer water systems and a brighter future.
The app was created as a project sprint for The Opportunity Project, a collaboration hosted by the US Census Bureau that brings together technology companies, communities, and federal agencies to create digital tools that solve real-world problems and make people's lives better. In 2022 teams were tasked with designing and developing solutions to help under-resourced communities apply for funding under the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law.
Overview
🧑🏾💼 My Role: Lead Product Manager on a team of 15
🏃🏾 Sprint: 7 Weeks
👎🏾 Problem: Under-resourced communities in America face difficulties in accessing Bipartisan Infrastructure Law funding because of inefficiencies in the grant application process.
🧑🏾🤝🧑🏾 Users: Community Leaders in Under-Resourced Communities
🧑🏾⚕️ Scoping: Lead Pipe Replacement: Communities do not have updated data on lead pipe inventory and this makes it difficult for community leaders to apply for funding and grants to replace these pipes, as applications need budget estimates based on inventory.
🙌🏾 Solution: Develop a digital tool to engage communities in mapping lead pipe service lines using open data to provide estimates. This will help in applying for federal funding for replacements. The tool will make the inventory accessible to various stakeholders, including residents, local governments, engineers, academics, and non-profit organizations.
The Task
The Opportunity Project is an initiative that aims to improve access to government data and services through technology solutions. Each year, they issue challenges to teams, inviting them to develop innovative solutions to complex policy issues. In 2022, the prompt addressed the issue of community leaders with fewer resources were struggling to access funding and grants available in the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law due to various challenges.
Alumni from General Assembly, an educational organization that provides practical, skills-based training in technology, design, and business, were invited to participate in the challenge. They were given six weeks to develop a working product to present to the panel. Our team of 15 recent graduates, including me as the lead product manager, worked on the project using an Agile Product Sprint methodology. The team had diverse backgrounds in data science, data analysis, UX design, and software engineering, which helped us create a comprehensive solution.
The Team
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User Experience Design
Najwa Hossain | UX Designer/PM
Parita Shah | UX Designer
Jamie Ramsay | UX Researcher
Natasha DiCostanzo | UX Designer
Isa Sabraw | UX Designer
Maddy Hale | UX Designer
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Data Scientists & Data Analysts
Robb Herndon | Data Scientist
Cristina Lara | Data Analyst
Kevin Wu | Data Analyst
Alessandro Chiari | Data Scientist
Anna Rutledge | Data Scientist
Manu Mulaveesala | Data Scientist
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Software Engineering
Lawrence O’Regan-Lloyd | Software Engineer
Veena Prakash | Software Engineer
Timothy Moon | Software Engineer
Alexandria Delaney | Software Engineer
The Story
I was honored to have the amazing opportunity to be the Lead Product Manager of this 15 person remote team. Because of my background in Economics Policy this was seen as being a good fit by General Assembly program organizers. Although I was a bit nervous, I decided to allow this opportunity to help me grow as a leader who facilitates not - only a great user experience but also a great learning experience for my team. After-all, I could bring over-achieving school project energy to this experience, which I had plenty of :)
I believe in democratically ideating, of making decisions as a team and having team members feel a degree of ownership over their pieces of the final product. One of the best ways to do this is to encourage everyone to vocalize their thoughts. I did not want the direction of the project to be a UX decision alone. So, from the beginning, I hosted a full team meeting where people can pitch a type of grant to focus on - having a specific scope to rally around would help not get bogged down by feature-creep.
A UX researcher made a very compelling case for lead pipe replacement as our scoping topic. They told us, old pipes with lead fixtures were at risk of leaching lead into home water systems, and since no amount of lead is safe for human consumption, the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law was being proactive in their effort to replace all of the lead in the water delivery systems across the United States. Under-resourced communities are struggling to apply for and access funding for this initiative- and the next step would be to investigate why.
Two other topics revolved around broadband internet access and environmental remediation, but lead pipes won the rank-choice voting exercise the team participated in - mostly due to the compelling circumstance Jamie ( our head UX Researcher ) outlined.
On Lead Pipes
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Although the U.S. Congress banned the use of lead pipes, in 1986, no requirement was made to remove existing lead lines, which leach lead as they corrode. An estimated 9.7-12.8 million lead pipes carry drinking water to the homes of at least 22 million people. Prior to the 1980s, lead was a commonly-used material in water service lines, solder and even faucets.
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There are no safe level of lead, so removal and replacement is the only certain solution. Lead exposure risks in children include rashes, decreased cognitive function, and behavioral problems. In adults, it can result in increased blood pressure, hypertension and can lead to coronary heart disease and death
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Unfortunately, mapped locations of service lines have never been well-documented, historically. While computerized modeling can predict which homes might have lead pipes based on construction dates, accurate map data for replacement programs relies on citizens visually checking their property’s service lines and communicating that information to local governments
My UX team's research taught me through their secondary research and interviews a lot about lead pipes in this country - a material that was only federally banned in 1986 - usually found in the water mains or in the conjoining joints of pipes. The reason a lot of community leaders struggle to apply for the funding set aside for them is that in order to create a budget and plan for replacement, a part of the grant application, they need accurate updated data about where the lead pipes are located - and a lot of these building records and data points are not easily available digitally.
Our UX Team arrived at the following Problem Statement after conducting a whopping 8 interviews with community leaders in 3 days:
Lower-resourced communities need a way to engage residents in the lead line inventory process so that they can gather the data that they need to apply for federal funding.
What Features?
Multiple ideation sessions and scoping sessions lead us to deciding that since a big part of community leaders’ concern was that there was a general lack of awareness about lead pipes in the community. And a lot of towns and municipalities did not have the extra funding needed to go door to door and get buy-in.
Our solution was three-pronged:
A searchable map
Informative infographics
A way to submit data
We wanted to use publicly available data to predict lead pipe data. This is where my economics background came in handy. I assisted the data team in finding census data based on variables like
the estimated year of construction,
the value of the house
the ratio of structure value to land value
the type of house (i.e. single story, split level, two-story, etc.)
and the year that fire hydrant was stamped (installed)
to create a probability map - an infographic component that raised awareness and instructed ordinary home dwellers to investigate their fixture and add to the accuracy of the map.
Lucky for us we had one town's dataset to construct our prediction model - Hazel Crest, IL. Based on their case study we replicated their model using only publicly available data and the model was over 90% similar in its estimation of likelihood of lead. Hazel Crest’s case study was based on constructing a prediction model- the one they used, with the help of Blue Conduit, to apply for lead pipe replacement funds.
But we wanted to test the accuracy of the prediction so we tested the formula on a Flint dataset. It worked! Using the main 5 variables, our formula was able to pinpoint lead pipes to up to 95% accuracy. Our Data team did a great job!
These probabilities themselves can be used to create budgets and plans for community leaders, but the crowdsourcing component is useful as
a means to get more accurate data
a way to increase support for potentially disruptive pipe replacement by spreading information on risks
a community signal to community leaders that this is a priority for their citizens
Must Have, Should Have, Could Have and Won’t have discussions were held on Figjam where there was 10 minutes of silent sorting leading to the development of a scope document outlining P1 features to help keep the team's eyes on the prize.
Must Have Features
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Searchable Map
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Mobile First Interface
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Data Layers on Lead Pipe Status
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Guided Instructions
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Ability to Share the App
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Way to Download Data
Agile Leadership
The first few weeks because of the size of the team I sent daily email updates to the team and only held full-team meetings three times a week. Each team lead held their own meetings and this had a siloing effect on production. After taking a course on LinkedIn Learning on Agile Leadership and a frank conversation I had during a Data check-in with a helpful scrum-certified teammate I realized daily stand-ups were way more essential. As soon as these were implemented two weeks in, the siloing of different teams ceased to be a frustration and information flowed freely, even if not every member could make every meeting.
I took a course on Figma handoffs to Development and shared a template with the design team as they were in the final stages of user-testing their mobile wire-frame. I also encouraged team members to be cross-functional. Often, a member of UX research with a background in behavioral sciences sat in on a Data meeting, a Development member would listen in on a Design decision, and a member of the Data team would convene with members of Dev to ensure the handoffs were up to spec.
As new career transitioners, I encouraged all team members, whether they were team leads or cross-functional liaisons, to brand themselves as heroes of the product and to be acutely aware of their own impact on the project.
Storytelling & Impact
Lead pipe replacement is a very technical topic, and data and development are also very technical, which is why storytelling in our biweekly check-ins with the panel, cohort presentations, and the final demo presentation were essential to carry the message forward. Instead of burdening my UX team with countless deliverables, a journey map humanizing our user - the citizen and community leader - helped carry the narrative and therefore emphasized the importance of our solution.
The Conscious Citizen
A Conscious Citizen encounters on social media or their news feed that they live in an area that possibly has lead components in the water system - this leads to concern. However, it is clear that they can take steps to assure the safety of their drinking water.
The link to the Get the Lead Out application walks the citizen through the steps they would need to take to see if their water meter has lead, this step by step is heavily influenced by the NPR backed website that does an excellent visual representation.
Being able to submit the user’s information, assuring them that this will be given to their local representative in order to apply for grants towards replacement, and being able to spread awareness on the issue gives the user a sense of relief and connection to their greater community.
The Community Leader
Our user research interviews with various community leaders such as the Utilities Manager at City of Eau Claire, the Village Manager of Hazel Crest, IL and various other leaders in the charge of water safety revealed that the main pain points around applying for lead pipe replacement funding were:
Grants often require budgets and cost estimates based on inventory data
Hiring an engineering firm to complete Proposal Plan required for application can be cost prohibitive for some lower-resourced communities
The Application process can be daunting for communities who do not have staffing to collect data, signatures, etc. as inventory and execution require community cooperation
The city faced various issues with gaining community buy-in for lead pipe remediation (e.g., landowner refusals, lack of awareness, high amount of renters)
An approach where users are willingly learning and participating in data collection to remediate the issue would go a long way in completing the inventory data sets. The tool can also be used to go door to door and easily log suspected households.
UX Writing and Hierarchy for Readability
Before
After
This was also important within the app - I functioned as the final auditor of UX writing within the app - to ensure the language was as simple as possible. Here is an example of some of the changes I made from the mid-fidelity prototype to the final prototype to make the sentences flow, especially when guiding a citizen in checking their lead pipe status:
Project Management Tools
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Notion
Without Notion, a fully customizable dashboard of links, meeting notes and links to deliverables - it would have been super easy to lose track of what Data, Design and Dev were working on.
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Google Docs
Important documents outlining major User Research Findings, The Data Hypothesis and most importantly, The Scope of P1 were distributed and mostly unedited - aside from comments - to make sure everyone was on the same page.
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Slack
All non-meeting communication was done on Slack, including Team Lead meetings with the General Assembly Organizers and management of meetings with various mentors were usually confirmed via Slack before emails or scheduled google calendar invites.
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Zoom
It would have been near impossible to pull off a fully remote - bi coastal- development sprint without out Lead Dev, Lawrence, having the foresight to set up a near 24hour Zoom channel for us with multiple breakout rooms where teams could chat, work and co-work.
Design Thinking & Collaboration Activities
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Voting
The original scoping of the product that lead to our honing into lead pipe replacement was decided via voting after group discussions, beating out “Grants targeting Internet Access” and “ Environmental Remediation”. This was done via rank-choice voting in Figma and Slack Polling for those who could not make it to the meeting.
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Google Docs
The Design Team Used How Might We’s to look at the Problem Statement from various angles which contributed to the Solution including:
-How might we incentivize or gamify locating and identifying lead pipes for public inventories?
-How might we bring community members and local governments together to facilitate lead pipe replacement programs?
-How might we make removing lead pipes understood as a high priority issue for community health?
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Landscape Mapping
After the Original UX Research Team presented their high-level takeaways I opened the floor to an ideation session where team members UX, Data, and Engineering could jot down their top-of-the-mind concepts for solutions. The next day we further fleshed out these thoughts. I made a Figjam where the team members could write down their potential solutions. We immediately ruled out solutions that involved increasing staff or the building of physical facilities and further parsed down potential solutions
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Must haves, Should haves, Could haves, Won’t haves
A ten minute timer was set and team members silently put features into one of the four categories. If there was disagreement they simply placed the feature in the space between two. “Mobile Version” was between Must Have and Should Have.
Ultimately a Mobile-First approach seemed appropriate to prioritize because:
-It is easier to share on social media to raise awareness on a mobile phone
-It will be easier for people with no broadband to see the solution on a phone if they had data
-It would be easier to take a picture a lead pipe using your phone to and upload that information onto the service
The Product
The Product Presentation
Presenting the demo to The Opportunity Project panelists which included Oliver Wise, Chief Data Officer of the U.S. Department of Commerce and Denice Ross, the U.S. The Chief Data Officer who also gave excellent guidance in our bi-weekly check-ins was daunting, but our team was prepared and proud to present their hard work.
One representative from each team spoke in a condensed 5 minute time-slot ( We had a full 10 minutes to present to our General Assembly Audience where we fleshed out the steps in more detail ) with flawless handoffs - making sure to segue into the importance of each contributing piece of the solution.
One of my final lines in the presentation was with:
We found that sometimes specific problems need specialized solutions.
The reason I added this line is this- most of the other teams focused on the information infrastructure around applying for grants in a more general way, they focused on potential ways to sort, potential plug-ins to alert leaders, or chat-bots to assist in the application process. If they used specific examples of types of grants, it was to test their solutions with a use-case. But, our team truly looked at a type of funding - lead pipe replacement, which is often an after-thought in infrastructure, and built our solution around it, in some ways forgoing the objective the brief seemed to be pointing us to. We did this - not because we wanted to be different, but because that's where user research took us.
I’m proud of my team for listening to their users, for being willing to get into the thick of it on a technical topic, for going on a wild-goose chase after data that may have not existed, and for being up for the challenges thrown at them. I’m glad I was able to support my team and be a part of this challenge in a leadership capacity.
Our solution was lauded for being innovative by the panelists & even though we are career transitioners with no knowledge about how to get organization or non-profit funding to launch this solution, all of our work is published on Notion, Github, and this website and all of our data is pulled from publicly available data sources. I hope it services organizations out there to Get the Lead Out!
Next Steps
For Design
According to the brief, our main user should be community leaders of under-resourced areas, but due to our user research findings we decided that getting the community involved would solve community leaders’ main pain point. However, the next priorities for the designers would be to ensure that the desktop version is built out for the community leader to easily navigate the grant application process by downloading the data, and intuitively attach to a budget proposal. Thus will need an entirely new user flow.
We need to conduct user testing on the current design and gauge the emotions of the users. As a PM, my instruction to the Design Team was to try to elicit a response of concern but not panic upon learning of potential lead-pipe status of your residence. Feedback on emotional responses and clarity of instructions is also a key component of gathering accurate data. We can also track reach by seeing how many people use the app upon seeing shared social media posts & experiment with different platform layouts that increase utilization.
For Development
Along the lines of Design - being able to streamline and access necessary data for community leaders who may not be especially tech-savvy would be the next step.
Translating the solution into a desktop version may need different technologies & capabilities for the expanded use of the community leader as a user.
For Data
Finding lead-pipe data was the biggest challenge for the Data Team. Creating and mapping the data, investigating false positives and false negatives would likely be a further step after more implementation of the model in real-world scenarios.
Tutorializing the data model-making process to inspire cities to come up with their own models would likely be a worthwhile endeavor and lead to more findings down the line.