Telecom GIS Redesign Case Study Client Project
Sole UX designer
Research, audit & UI design
8 distinct modules
GIS system redesign
9+ live modules
Executive approval
You are a NOC (Network Operations Center) engineer responsible for monitoring network infrastructure and keeping services stable.
You need clear data visualization tools to surface details hidden across daily operations. The right view helps you spot patterns, anticipate problems, and act before they become critical.
The challenge: Turn complex operational data into signals you can understand and act on early.
Telecom operations depend on fast, location-aware decisions. This is where VisionWave's Infrastructure management tools comes into the picture. We provides one reliable view of towers, coverage, and network activity so they can spot issues early, understand their impact, and keep services running without switching between disconnected tools.
The GIS mapping system was a heavily used component in our telecom-centric modules. These modules visualize telecom tower locations worldwide, enabling users to manage them effectively.
This component was already deployed and running actively on client sites across multiple operational modules, including: RAN, Topology, Warehouse Management, Logistics, and Coverage.
Previous product interface
Initially our approach was the standard Heuristic Evaluation of the existing live GIS module.
However, after documenting the usability flaws, I realized that a full redesign is a better approach, because it will provide better communication with the stakeholders and developers.
I asked the design lead and the CEO for more time to find an effective solution. Based on my request, I got 1 week to complete the task.
A strict 1-week timeline made rigorous usability sessions impossible, and no budget was allocated to recruit specialized enterprise users for testing.
We ran usability testing within our team to identify problems in the existing UI.
Direct competitive analysis was limited because leading enterprise telecom tools are not public.
We analyzed similar GIS tools, including Google Maps and Atlas, to identify familiar and effective patterns.
We also had to implement major design improvements while keeping development efforts to a minimum.
For each identified problem, I used my development knowledge and collaborated with the development lead to choose low-effort decisions with the greatest impact.
Rather than being blocked by the constraints, I overcame them by focusing heavily on heuristic principles, conducting competitive analysis from similar GIS products, and leveraging my own technical background. I collaborated closely with the Development Lead to validate technical feasibility, ensuring every design decision solved a real operational constraint.
For the map, we were using the Google Maps API, which supported multiple themes. In the previous version of the GIS UI, the “Standard” theme was set. It displayed multiple layers on the map, such as Terrain and Grasslands, which were unnecessary for the user managing and tracking the site status, and increased the user's cognitive load.
We updated the map theme to “Silver”, which removed most unnecessary elements from the base map for 6+ modules and instantly improved the UI with minimal Development effort.
Along with this, we updated the Map pins' style and size to make the UI more visually appealing and reduce clutter when multiple sites are present in one area.
These small decisions made a big impact on the overall UI.
The site type navigation component was built for a specific module named “RAN”, which has several usability flaws, such as:
For this, we updated the component's design, making only the KPI value a clickable hyperlink with an arrow icon on the right to clearly indicate to the user.
In high-density network areas, the map suffered from severe marker overlap. This hid critical site data, directly impairing the user's ability to monitor regional health or make accurate, at-a-glance infrastructure judgments.
I resolved this by introducing dynamic map clustering, paired with a synchronized layer panel.
The idea behind this emerged from the competitive analysis we conducted.
In our first presentation to the CEO, we received feedback to remove site creation features from the map. This was based on the complexity of site creation, which will always be done via a form. This is because, when creating a site such as eNodeB, the user will be required to provide a precise location for the site, which will be derived from the latitude and longitude data provided by the user and not by randomly clicking on the map.
There were 4 different buttons across multiple modules on the map, used to create a site on the map. We removed all of them, discussed with the product manager, and got approval. This is how we reduced the user's cognitive load.
The 1-week sprint culminated in a high-stakes presentation to the CEO and executive leadership.
By prioritizing technical feasibility and scalability, the UI patterns I established were immediately approved and safely scaled across 9+ live modules.
The CEO explicitly praised the attention to detail and my ability to balance UX improvements with engineering reality. The presentation secured my reputation as a strategic thinker within the organization.
Usability is not about adding more features; sometimes it’s about removing the unnecessary ones and focusing on the right things.