ARIS Dashboard: Transforming fitness training through centralised, data-driven solutions

My Role

As the sole designer, I was responsible for designing a dashboard that integrates with the ARIS app to enhance gym trainers' workflows. Through in-depth user research, I uncovered key pain points and identified specific needs, shaping a design strategy focused on delivering an intuitive and efficient interface. My role encompassed the entire design process—from research and conceptualisation to wireframing and final handoff—collaborating closely with developers and data scientists to ensure the ARIS Dashboard effectively streamlined tracking, analyzing client performance, and meeting the trainers' needs.

Scope

•UX Design •UI Design •User research •Prototyping •Usability testing •End-to-end

Tools

•Figma •Figjam •Jira •Google Workspace

Time Frame

2023

Overview

ARIS is a fitness tracking app designed for gym goers to effortlessly log and monitor their workout progress. When paired with the ARIS Band—a wearable device developed by Microtube Technologies—the app provides automatic workout tracking, additional workout metrics, and precise progress insights, enhancing the overall fitness experience.

This opened up an opportunity to explore whether this is a viable area to venture into.

Before diving into this and assuming that this is what personal trainers need, I took the time to engage with personal trainers across diverse settings—freelance PTs, local gyms, and large-scale fitness centers—to gain a comprehensive understanding of their challenges.

The Problem

Uncovering inefficiencies in trainers' workflows: Fragmented system and subjective assessments

10+ personal trainers were interviewed to better understand their current workflows, and identify areas for improvement.

Trainers often rely on a mix of tools—including iPad notes, physical documents, Excel sheets, and their own memory—leading to fragmented and inconsistent record-keeping. This manual and scattered approach makes it difficult to efficiently store and access client progress and information, as updates are typically made after sessions, leading to incomplete records.
Trainers often rely on subjective assessments to gauge clients' capabilities and progress, leading to significant guesswork. Questions like, "How tired are you?" or "Can you do one more rep?" lack precision and consistency. Additionally, the absence of structured methods to educate clients on the rationale behind their training plans resulted in poor understanding and low continuous engagement. This lack of clarity contributed to inconsistent evaluations, ultimately hindering their training progress and having effective workout plans.

"We try it out for 1-2 months and see how it goes. If it doesn't go as expected, then we tweak the program. But sometimes they feel demotivated and just stop their training."

“ When I asked my clients ‘can you do one more rep?’ It seems like they can do it, but then they said they can't. I wish I had a proper way to understand their limits and not just gut instict.”

“It's actually quite busy as a PT, I’m spending more time after sessions inputting their info than I am actually training my clients during their workouts. "

The Solution and Impact

A digital solution for data integration and objective performance tracking

Data synchronisation
Implemented a data synchronisation system from the ARIS app to the ARIS dashboard based on the trainer-trainee relationship. This automated workout logging system integrated with the ARIS Band allowed trainers to track clients’ workouts in real-time, eliminating manual note-taking and achieving 100% consistency in record-keeping.
Centralised information
A centralised digital dashboard that consolidates all client information, including progress logs, health conditions, and past training data, which are quickly accessible via desktop and mobile devices.
Objective progression
Providing visual progress dashboards and structured feedback tools in the ARIS dashboard, enabling trainers to provide clients with clear, data-backed insights into their progress and the reasoning behind specific training exercises.

The Process

Who am I designing it for?

Based on the user interviews with gym trainers, I developed two distinct user archetypes were with varying levels of tech-savviness as this was a major differentiating factor during our interviews. The primary focus was to understanding the specific tasks trainers needed to accomplish, aligning with their jobs-to-be-done and uncovering unique challenges each group faced.

Journey map

A journey map was created to visualise the user experience, identify key opportunities for improvement, and foster a shared understanding of the current challenges.

High fidelity designs

With a tight timeline, I collaborated closely with data scientists and developers to design and implement data summaries, charts, and graphs that effectively showcased key performance metrics and large data sets.

Does it work?

At this stage, we onboarded a group of 8 beta testers consisting of gym trainers from different settings to evaluate the features. The goal was to ensure the platform aligned with their workflows, offering the necessary tools, metrics, and visual displays to effectively address their pain points.

Based on their feedback, 75% of gym trainers sought greater flexibility in viewing past workout sessions. Hence, I replaced the toggle option with a dynamic dropdown menu.

This allows trainers to access a variety of key metrics at a glance, including:

Total Workout Volume : Tracks the total weight lifted across exercises, showcasing strength progression.
Reps and Sets Progression : Monitors improvements in repetitions and sets for key movements and endurance.
Target Metric Progress : Highlights progress toward client-specific goals, such as fat loss, muscle gain, or endurance.
Frequently Performed Exercises : Identifies patterns in exercises and muscle groups for better program adjustments.

In addition to the exercises themselves, 62% of trainers expressed the need for an indicator to identify any overlooked muscle groups or key components in their routine planning. To address this, I integrated muscle group icons from the ARIS App, visually highlighting the targeted areas within each routine. This enhancement provides trainers with a quick, at-a-glance overview of workout composition, ensuring a more balanced training plan.

All trainers highlighted that having a clear indicator for scheduled sessions would be highly beneficial, allowing them to quickly see their daily plans without needing to click into each date individually.

Additionally, most clients follow flexible session structures based on overall program duration and progression rather than a fixed number of sessions. As a result, this feature was removed to accommodate the highly personalised and dynamic nature of client schedules.

The analytics page underwent a near-complete redesign to meet the trainers' demand for more comprehensive insights, tailored to various workout types and session metrics.

In summary ...

Centralised dashboard
Consolidated client data, including progress logs, health conditions, and past sessions, into a single, easily accessible platform that is complete and available across multiple devices.
Automated Tracking
Integrated the ARIS Band into trainers' workout routines to automatically log exercises, reducing manual data entry and providing objective, data-driven insights to eliminate guesswork and enhance workout precision.
Advanced metrics and visual feedback tools
Providing comprehensive workout and session analytics to clearly showcase progress, along with visual feedback tools to help clients gain a deeper understanding of their achievements.

Challenges and learnings

A major challenge arose from collaborating with developers who had established preferences for certain features, which sometimes conflicted with insights from usability testing and research. This led to difficult discussions about feature prioritisation and alignment with user needs. To address this, I took a proactive approach by facilitating open, insight-driven conversations that focused on user pain points and requirements, ensuring that development decisions were grounded in real user behaviour. By working closely with the team, we were able to create a product that balanced both user and business needs, while fostering a collaborative and productive working relationship.
Another key challenges I faced during the ARIS Dashboard project was navigating the specialised jargon and technical terms used in fitness and performance tracking. Terms related to fitness, workout types, and associated data metrics such as "velocity-based training," "rep-max calculations," etc was new to me. To overcome this, I immersed myself in learning the specific terminology used by fitness professionals and worked closely with subject matter experts to ensure I fully understood the nuances of the product.

From Guesswork To Precision