New Elegant Interface for Legal Practice Management: An Interview With Rocket Matter’s Lead Designer

Since launching in 2008, Rocket Matter’s elegant and intuitive user interface (UI) has been a major differentiator. The popular practice management platform saw many improvements and upgrades over the years, but it was time for a complete overhaul to continue its transformational journey this year. Such an undertaking can be a herculean task. There are literally hundreds of aspects that must be managed, but, the end result can be breath-taking, as it is in this case.

We sat down with Rocket Matter’s lead designer, Ed Case, to find out about the inspiration behind the “Atlas” release featuring the bold, new interface and what users can expect from the redesigned platform.

Ed, what were some of your main inspirations behind the new design of Rocket Matter?

We wanted to make Rocket Matter cleaner, bolder and brighter. We wanted to expand the footprint of the application to take advantage of larger, higher resolution displays. In doing this, we were able to improve typography and optimize the layout to make the app easier and more enjoyable to use. It looks and feels like a brand new application, and our users are loving what they see.

What are some of the ways this new design improves the overall user experience and workflow?

In Atlas, the information our users interact with every day is so much easier to digest and navigate. We’ve taken very congested grids of information and spaced them out in an optimized layout. The application has more whitespace which lets you focus on one area of concern without peripheral clutter or distractions. We’ve brought some navigational elements that were multiple clicks deep into the main navigation panel. The application has gotten a calculated boost of efficiency for sure.

How is the new application designed to save time for busy legal professionals?

We have reduced the amount of clicks it takes to get things done by optimizing the navigation. Over time all those little improvements really add up. Another nice addition is the global “Add New” button that lets you add new items from anywhere in the application. Depending on your location in the app, this handy little menu will offer different options too. It knows what you’re doing and does its best to offer the most appropriate options. Our whole “Add a Matter” flow has changed for the better and it’s now incredibly easy to complete this action. Adding new contacts and clients is super easy now, also.

How is the overall navigation experience improved?

What we did first was move the navigation to the left side of the screen. This is a more natural placement. We then re-thought the navigational sequencing and grouping while adding new items to the main menu. Another cool feature is that you can collapse the navigation while keeping it totally functional. This frees up even more space for your work, especially if you’re on a smaller screen.

Is there anything else we should know about the redesign of Rocket Matter? Any other features that make for a better overall experience?

As mentioned before, the global “Add New” button is an awesome addition. People have loved it so far. We also completely redesigned the Rocket Matter Calendar. It now handles busy days more gracefully and has a new agenda view which lists all of your events for a given time. I’m particularly pleased about the “Add Matter” workflow. It’s so much more efficient. The billing dashboard has been redesigned as well, and I really like how it turned out. Honestly every corner of the application has been revamped so the overall effect and daily experience of using Rocket Matter has changed completely. Judging by our testing and the early response, I think users are going to love it.

Ed Case is the Lead UX/UI Designer for Rocket Matter. He has been coding and designing cloud based applications and websites for over a decade. His fine arts background blends well with his focus on user centered design and he loves making things that people are passionate about using.