A calm kibbutz landscape with trees, houses, hills and an unlabelled water tower

01 / PRODUCT DESIGN CASE STUDY

01 / PRODUCT DESIGN CASE STUDY

Hivo. Clarity when it matters most.

Hivo. Clarity when it matters most.

Hivo. Clarity when it matters most.

A calmer way to manage people, needs, and community.

A calmer way to manage people, needs, and community.

B2B SAAS

/

PERSONAL PROJECT

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UX & UI DESIGN

02 / CONTEXT & PROBLEM

Communities deserve
a real system.

Communities deserve
a real system.

Communities deserve
a real system.

After October 7, I was evacuated from Kibbutz Mefalsim. I watched a few dedicated community managers keep everything together, people, information, requests and constant communication.

After October 7, I was evacuated from Kibbutz Mefalsim. I watched a few dedicated community managers keep everything together, people, information, requests and constant communication.

They were doing incredible work with very limited tools: scattered Excel sheets, endless WhatsApp threads and phone calls.

They were doing incredible work with very limited tools: scattered Excel sheets, endless WhatsApp threads and phone calls.

If businesses rely on CRMs, why shouldn’t communities have a system of their own?

If businesses rely on CRMs, why shouldn’t communities have a system of their own?

Community updates

Who’s coordinating medical needs?

Has anyone followed up?

Community needs.xlsx

Need

Owner

Update

Missed calls

Community coordination

Illustration of the existing workflow

Powerful enough for a crisis. Simple enough for every day.

How might we help a community manager see what needs attention, understand the family behind it and take the next step without piecing together scattered information?

03 / UNDERSTANDING THE WORK

People first. Then the system.

People first. Then the system.

People first. Then the system.

Hivo began with my experience of community coordination during evacuation. I used that context to frame the work a manager needs to do, and the questions the design should help answer.

Hivo began with my experience of community coordination during evacuation. I used that context to frame the work a manager needs to do, and the questions the design should help answer.

The starting point

Families, locations and requests were spread across conversations and tools. Keeping a shared picture became a design priority.

The key questions

Who needs attention? What is their situation? What can the manager do next? These questions shaped the information hierarchy.

The design focus

Connect the community overview to family context and request creation. These are working design priorities, not measured outcomes.

Three needs that shaped the direction.

A shared view of the community.

A shared view of the community.

A family’s information kept together.

A family’s information kept together.

A clear route from context to action.

A clear route from context to action.

04 / UNDERSTANDING THE LANDSCAPE

Powerful tools.
A different purpose.

Powerful tools.
A different purpose.

Powerful tools.
A different purpose.

Existing tools offered useful patterns for organizing work, managing cases and engaging people. I used those patterns to define a more focused starting point for Hivo: the family.

Existing tools offered useful patterns for organizing work, managing cases and engaging people. I used those patterns to define a more focused starting point for Hivo: the family.

PLATFORM

PRIMARY FOCUS

HIVO’S DESIGN RESPONSE

monday.com logo

monday.com

monday.com

Work management

Boards and workflows for organizing team work.

Family-first structure

Location, contacts and requests belong to one family record.

Salesforce logo

Salesforce

Salesforce

Nonprofit Cloud

Program and case management for nonprofit services.

Urgent needs in view

A dedicated dashboard table brings families needing attention forward.

NationBuilder logo

NationBuilder

NationBuilder

Community engagement

A people database and tools for organizing engagement.

A clear daily overview

Families, requests and locations form the community picture.

Platform focus is based on official product documentation. Hivo’s column describes my design decisions.

Start with the family.
Keep the whole community in view.

Start with the family.
Keep the whole community in view.

05 / UNDERSTANDING THE MANAGER

One manager.
A whole community.

One manager.
A whole community.

One manager.
A whole community.

Yoav, 47

Yoav, 47

Working persona · Community manager

Working persona · Community manager

Kibbutz Mefalsim · Former educator

Keep the community moving.

Keep the community moving.

Yoav is a working persona for the community manager. His role connects an urgent need with a family’s wider situation, while other requests keep arriving.

01 / VISIBILITY

Urgent needs can disappear.

Scattered updates make priorities hard to see. The dashboard brings the community picture and urgent needs into one view.

02 / CONTEXT

Every tool holds a different piece.

A manager needs the family’s context before acting. The family card connects location, contact details and requests.

03 / CLARITY

The next action competes with the data.

Finding information is only part of the work. A request can begin from the family context, giving the manager a clear next step.

06 / FROM INSIGHTS TO DECISIONS

Human needs. Product decisions.

Family card · Original Hivo design
Family card · Original Hivo design
See 09, from family to action

07 / CONNECTING THE SYSTEM

One family. Connected to the whole community.

One family. Connected to the whole community.

One family. Connected to the whole community.

Community, family, need and action form the product’s structure. Each step adds context, so the manager can move from a broad view to a specific request.

  1. 01

    Community

    Who needs our attention?

    Families, requests and locations form the shared overview.

  2. 02

    Family

    What is their situation?

    Contact details, location and requests stay together.

  3. 03

    Need

    What needs to happen?

    The family context gives meaning to an individual need.

  4. 04

    Action

    What can I do next?

    Create an aid request from the family’s record.

A system built around people.

The family is the anchor. The overview helps a manager find the situation, and the family record carries its context into the next action.

08 / DESIGNING FOR THE BIG PICTURE

See the whole. Spot what matters.

The dashboard establishes a hierarchy: understand the community, notice what needs attention, then move into the relevant family. Each level answers a different question.

The dashboard establishes a hierarchy: understand the community, notice what needs attention, then move into the relevant family. Each level answers a different question.

Original Hivo dashboard with community totals, status distribution, locations and urgent family needs
Attention without alarm.

The community overview keeps the wider situation visible. A dedicated area brings urgent family needs into focus.

01 / ORIENT

Read the situation

A community overview creates a starting point before the manager opens individual records.

02 / UNDERSTAND

Find what is urgent

Needs and priorities deserve a clear place in the hierarchy, so they do not compete equally with every detail.

03 / ACT

Keep the detail close

Family information stays one step away. The overview stays scannable while the context remains accessible.

THE TRADEOFF · A clear overview means keeping some detail one level deeper. The family view supplies that context before a request is created.

09 / FROM CONTEXT TO ACTION

From a need
to a clear next step.

From a need
to a clear next step.

From a need
to a clear next step.

Follow one path through the designed screens: understand the community, find a family, review their situation and create an aid request. The designed flow ends at request creation.

Follow one path through the designed screens: understand the community, find a family, review their situation and create an aid request. The designed flow ends at request creation.

CommunityFamilyContextAction
THE COMMUNITY

See who needs attention.

Start with the dashboard. Urgent needs sit alongside the community overview, so a manager can spot what deserves a closer look.

THE DESIGN DECISION

Make priorities visible without turning the whole dashboard into an alarm.

Original Hivo community dashboard
Community overview
THE FAMILY

Find the family behind the need.

Move into family management. Location, status, contacts and request context help the manager find the right household.

THE DESIGN DECISION

Use the family as the link between the overview and an individual situation.

Original Hivo family management screen
Family management
THE CONTEXT

Understand before acting.

Open the family card to read its details and access its requests. The personal context stays close to the next action.

THE DESIGN DECISION

Reveal detail when it is needed, while keeping a connection to the family list.

One family.The full context.
Family details
THE ACTION

Turn a need into a request.

Create an aid request from the family context. The flow connects the need to a household instead of creating another disconnected message.

THE DESIGN DECISION

Keep the request and the people it concerns connected from the start.

Original Hivo family card and new aid request form
Create an aid request
THE DESIGN TRADEOFF

Context before action.

WHAT THIS ENABLES

Starting from a family keeps personal details and the aid request connected.

WHAT STILL NEEDS CARE

Finding the family adds a step. Search and the route from an urgent need must remain clear when time is limited.

This walkthrough shows the designed path through request creation. It does not demonstrate completed aid delivery or measured service outcomes.

10 / WHAT I LEARNED

Clarity is a design decision.

The most important work was deciding what belongs together, what deserves attention and when detail should appear.

The most important work was deciding what belongs together, what deserves attention and when detail should appear.

Connect the pieces.

A family record becomes useful when identity, location and needs can be understood together.

Make priorities legible.

A calm interface still needs a strong hierarchy. Urgent information must stand out without making the whole dashboard feel urgent.

Keep action in context.

Request creation starts from the family. This preserves the relationship between the person, their situation and the help being requested.

11 / A NOTE FROM THE DESIGNER

Designing for
real people.

Hivo was deeply inspired by my own experience during the war, after being evacuated from Kibbutz Mefalsim following the events of October 7th. Seeing how communities struggled to manage information, urgent needs and communication during uncertainty showed me how much clearer, more structured tools were needed.

Designing for pressure. Clarity matters most when people are under pressure. When communities manage urgent needs, confusion creates delays, so every interaction had to feel simple, focused and easy to act on.

Systems should feel human. Beyond dashboards and workflows, the challenge was designing a system people could emotionally trust, not only organized, but calmer and more supportive for managers and families.

Complexity needs structure. Clear hierarchy, prioritization and guided workflows turned scattered data into actionable decisions, without losing flexibility.

With love, Nati

11 / A NOTE FROM THE DESIGNER

Designing for
real people.

Hivo was deeply inspired by my own experience during the war, after being evacuated from Kibbutz Mefalsim following the events of October 7th. Seeing how communities struggled to manage information, urgent needs and communication during uncertainty showed me how much clearer, more structured tools were needed.

Designing for pressure. Clarity matters most when people are under pressure. When communities manage urgent needs, confusion creates delays, so every interaction had to feel simple, focused and easy to act on.

Systems should feel human. Beyond dashboards and workflows, the challenge was designing a system people could emotionally trust, not only organized, but calmer and more supportive for managers and families.

Complexity needs structure. Clear hierarchy, prioritization and guided workflows turned scattered data into actionable decisions, without losing flexibility.

With love, Nati