EdTech Founders Who UX (Informed K12)

Iterations and lessons from Qian Wang

By Nicole Gallardo from Founders Who UX

In this Founders Who UX series, we’ll get an intimate look into the minds and lives of founders who found success by building their companies with a “UX mindset.” They’ll share their inspirational, personal, and sometimes messy journeys with us — providing wisdom, lessons learned, and practical tips along the way.

We’ll kick off this exciting collection with our first interview with Qian Wang, CTO and Co-Founder at Informed K12.

🎓 The crossroads between policy and education

NG: Can you tell us a bit about your journey before becoming a founder? What people, experiences, and things helped shape you into the founder you are today?

QW: My background is in computer science, which I studied as an undergrad. I then worked for a hedge fund for about six years as a quant — doing lots of math — pretty far away from thinking about users. But even then, I remember elements of problem-solving being used while working with traders. Eventually, however, I realized that working in finance wasn’t emotionally fulfilling for me and wanted to do something with a greater social impact, so I started taking classes in urban development and education. I began learning about how communities and people are impacted by things like housing policy, transportation policy, and of course, education policy. I studied how policy affects people’s levels of access to opportunity and tried to figure out where my technical skill set can intersect into that problem space.

One of my professors, who happened to be the Chief Information Officer for the State of Illinois, pulled me onto an Education Research Committee, and I started sneaking out of work early to do that project on the side. We wrote a set of ed policy recommendations for the governor of Illinois at the time, but unfortunately, it was unclear if he ever read them and nothing got implemented because policy doesn’t move that quickly.

I’ve always cared about having a direct impact, but I also wanted to have an impact on a bigger scale.

I knew technology was the way to expand my impact and that’s what led me to Stanford’s Graduate Program called Learning Design and Technology. The program brought together educators, designers, and engineers, to build tools for education. At the time, I was just hoping to meet people with similar interests and join an already existing company, I was not planning to be a founder. Then I met my co-founder and our CEO, Sarah Chou.

Sarah and I have very complementary skill sets. She started in the nonprofit space, and then eventually became a district administrator. She became very frustrated with how her district was operating and wanted to learn more about technology.

Since Sarah had been in the education space for some time, she was very used to outside people coming in and imposing their worldview into it, and she herself had ideals about us doing things a certain way. But we both really believed in understanding what is actually happening on the ground before coming up with ways to fix it. We wanted to just be of service first, so we created a joint internship, where we worked with a public and a private school classroom, doing a wide range of things from helping teachers deploy iPads to 1st-3rd graders to helping IT teams debug weird data issues.

NG: When you were doing the internship, did you already know by then that you wanted to start a company with your co-founder?

QW: No idea. The reason we created the joint internship was because we were very interested in helping public school districts. At the time, platforms like Coursera and edX had just come out. A lot of people were focused on the online space and self-directed learning, which definitely unlocked things for a lot of people — but it seemed out of reach for the average student, especially if Sarah thought about her district. We wanted to think about what would help the average public school district.

💡 The big idea (and the idea before it)

NG: How did you come up with the idea for Informed K12?

QW: We actually had a totally different idea at first that we came up with during our graduate program.

When we were helping teachers deploy iPads and new technology during the internship, we saw that they were all asking common questions about how to use it all. So our first idea was Chalk, a community for school districts to share their best practices.

Despite all the teachers giving us positive feedback about it during interviews, Chalk eventually fell apart.

We read somewhere to conduct focus groups where you film participants talking and have the interviewers leave the room. So that’s what we did. We left the room and kept filming. And that’s when the truth came out, which was comments like, “Oh, I don’t think I would use this because I tried something like this before. And it was just me and the kindergarten teacher going back and forth. No one wanted to join.”

The failure of Chalk ended up being our thesis project.

While the idea seemed great, it didn’t work in practice.

Sarah and I realized it was not the way to galvanize people participating in this type of community and we went all the way back to the drawing board.

We were already interacting with a lot of people during our internship, so we decided to conduct very open-ended informational interviews with them to understand their day and where things fit in. It was during these interviews where we heard a lot of challenges around paperwork. Sarah had also personally experienced it herself. Hearing about people’s daily challenges, we started to realize just how much our teachers and administrators have on their plates. People were getting app fatigue and more cynical about technology. We decided we really wanted to focus on taking something off their plates. So we formed Informed K12 to solve these challenges.

📌 Understanding the problem space and prioritization

NG: What did UX look like in the very early startup days?

QW: I remember, very early on, we searched for a design and research advisor and a sales advisor because those are two areas that Sarah and I were unfamiliar with. Sarah had worked in a district, I had coded, and we had already gone through the experience of making Chalk. But at Stanford, we were exposed to design thinking and HCI (human-computer interaction) so we were very aware of their importance as well. We knew we needed guidance around researching paperwork and go-to-market strategies, so sales, design, and research jumped out as prominent needs in the very beginning.

NG: Great. How were you able to prioritize UX and design thinking from that point on?

QW: Because we had the failure of Chalk, I knew we needed to REALLY understand the problem space. Even though Sarah had a personal experience with it, we didn’t want to base our solution on only that. We stayed focused on understanding the problem space and our users–reminding ourselves constantly that we are not our users.

Our problem space is so massive. I was worried that the paperwork problem could turn out like the email problem. Everybody wants to tame email but nobody has really found the perfect solution. Because of this worry, I continually asked myself, “How could we be the people to tame paperwork when it’s such a massive problem?” So for us to even feel confident enough to start a real company, we knew we needed to really, truly understand the problem space.

NG: That’s what sets you and InformedK12 apart. Many founders get attached to their solution idea before fully defining and understanding the problem they’re trying to solve.

After you validated your assumptions and got a solid understanding of the problem space, how did you prioritize which features to include in your product first? Did you have a roadmap? What were some of the techniques you used?

QW: Did we even have a real roadmap? Haha. I wouldn’t say that it was clear what our roadmap was. In the beginning, we had some conflicting pressures and it was a little bit all over the place.

At the time, EdTech freemium was a way to bypass the very slow-moving process of buyers in the district. Because of her experience as a district administrator, Sarah knew that even if a lot of teachers liked something, it did not mean the administrator would buy it. So based on that knowledge, we first wanted to target administrators.

However, in the incubators and cohorts we were in, most founders were targeting teachers and principals. We felt like maybe we were missing something and that we needed to do that too.

We weren’t clear on our go-to-market and during the first sales outreach, we decided to email everyone all the way from a teacher to an administrator. We had some interest from a few teachers, but the majority of the traction we got was from administrators like we originally assumed it would be.

We prioritized features based on how we could make the most lightweight tool for teachers but in the form of software that was sold to administrators. We started with our simplest feature which helps teachers send permission slips to parents. I think our double-sided approach added to the appeal and spread of people using it. Even though our sales strategy was formulated around what administrators wanted, we designed it for the end users–teachers.

NG: This is one of the most common UX challenges we are tasked with solving for new EdTech products: defining who the primary user is. For InformedK12, you prioritized helping teachers first, knowing admins needed to eventually be brought into the picture as well, correct?

QW: Yes. A tool to help teachers send permission slips to parents was the easiest for everyone to understand as a first step. Sarah was pitching our product to potential buyers while I was coding it. Our initial principles were centered around accessibility and ease of use. We started with a couple of wizards because we didn’t want anyone to be overwhelmed by the experience. Now, with our B2B model, those simple paradigms have evolved.

🎯 Finding product-market fit

NG: As you began refining your product, where did the feature requests and ideas come from? Teachers? Or did you immediately start capturing what admins wanted to move toward a true B2B model?

QW: At the time, we didn’t know whether we were B2B or B2C. Sarah kept a close connection to administrators and this allowed us to have lots of valuable conversations about what their biggest challenges were around field trips. Through emails and questioning, we discovered that administrators are not able to see anything that is happening on the ground other than on a 1:1 basis. They lacked a larger view.

We were learning what admins wanted as we were actively building out what a teacher would use.

NG: When did you find product-market fit?

QW: We were actively building the teacher experience, while also refining our understanding of the administrator’s workflow. These processes are what administrators really care about.

Teachers typically don’t set up workflows. They send something out to parents or perform simple tasks. However, administrators have important internal approval processes around permission slips that they must follow.

When we added the workflow portion of the forms to the product and finally had both sides figured out– teachers and administrators– we knew we had something that people wanted to pay for.

NG: How long did it take to find product-market fit? How long were you refining and testing things?

QW: It took us about a year and a half in total. Sarah and I spent the first year toiling away in the problem space and then we hired a couple of engineers to help us build, test, and refine the solution for another 4–6 months before we found it.

NG: Can you share a specific example of how you would test and build features?

QW: We were always trying to be light with testing because we had such a small team back then.

One feature we tested was an assistant that helped people set up forms. We weren’t sure if people really needed it or not, so we added a checkbox at the top of the forms that said something like, “Yes, I want the system to fill out this form for me”. If someone checked that box, Sarah would manually set it up for that person.

Eventually, we had enough people checking the box and knew we needed to build that feature.

🏈 Problem-solving approach and tactics

NG: How did you approach problem-solving in those early days?

QW: We had a design advisor who was helping us break down our seemingly massive problems into simpler ones to solve. With her guidance, we were able to pinpoint the primary problem to solve first, figure out how to do that, then tackle the next, and so on.

That guidance was probably our biggest advantage at the time because we didn’t have the language to know how to separate the problem and solution space as clearly as we needed. We would clump different problems together and she really helped us break them down.

NG: Were there any specific tactics that your design advisor or yourself used that made your problem-solving process successful?

QW: The most helpful tactics for us were still around user research and very generative research. While testing features like we did with the form assistant are huge components of good research, we went far beyond that.

Direct user testing was very helpful, but in those earlier stages, it was the exploratory generative research that we always went back to.

We would ask very detailed and specific questions like, “What did you do during your last payroll?” or “What happened last Friday?” rather than asking people to summarize their thoughts about something.

The most revelatory conversations we had were the most detailed and specific ones.

NG: That’s a great tip: be very specific in your questioning, while also asking open-ended questions. You want users to retell their actual experiences versus a hypothetical or what they think they did.

✏️ Making the rules and then eventually getting to break them

NG: How did UX and design thinking help shape your fundamental business decisions as the company grew?

QW: Strategically, our core product and design philosophies have really helped us because we’re not a sales-driven organization. Obviously, sales are very important, but because of all of the research we conducted, very early on we were able to make an explicit decision that we weren’t going to work with massive districts. We didn’t want to become a custom dev shop and decided not to do direct integrations.

We saw a lot of other companies doing this and it was definitely causing a lot of tension in the industry. In the K-12 space, the technology is so fragmented that everyone has a fantasy of integrating everything together. Everybody was asking if we would integrate and we said no. It was very hard to say no, but this was the right decision at that point.

NG: I’m sure that was very hard. You had to turn down short-term profit for the long-term game.

QW: Yes, it’s interesting. Those were very common things that we refused to do then. But as I always say,

“You make the rules, and then eventually you get to break them.”

Now, over a decade we are exploring lightweight ways to do integrations. We do need some way to get data from other systems or get data outside of our systems. We’ve been around since 2012, and we haven’t made this evolution until the last couple of years. I think those were the right decisions at the time.

NG: Let’s fast-forward a bit and talk more about Informed K12 today. What are you currently focused on? What does UX and product design look like now?

QW: We’re doing really well. Our proven success is helping fund an expansion to new territories and that’s really exciting.

Now we’re in a space where our product is a lot more advanced than it used to be. There are more advanced needs and we have power users who want to do certain things. In order to level up what our product is capable of and to really level up what the product is capable of, we are more open to those areas that we had previously shut off.

It’s always a continuum. Things can always shift due to the maturity of your product, so you have to be aware of what stage you’re in and what means you’re serving, and know that it can all change over time.

NG: That’s great advice to give to new founders. If you had taken the same path as everyone else was taking regarding integration, you’d be a totally different company today. But because you led with a UX mindset and based your strategic decisions on research, now you have a solid foundation to build upon.

QW: Exactly–we have our core. There are a lot of competitors in the space. If we hadn’t found our niche, it would’ve been easy to start chasing after adjacent competitors who do part of what we do.

NG: Any advice for new founders on how to make tough decisions?

QW: Having a strong product philosophy that can guide you in making those hard tradeoffs and decisions is really important. Because in the beginning, you’re just trying to get the next $1,000 and it’s very easy to prioritize short-term.

☀️ Keeping UX at the core as the company grows

NG: How do you make sure your team stays aligned today? How do you keep UX at the forefront and the core philosophy intact as you grow?

QW: Eventually we were able to hire a great VP of product who is really user-focused. There are many flavors of product leaders, but we were adamant about finding one that valued human-centered design.

One of the first things he introduced upon joining was continuous discovery. How do we make sure that we are talking to users every single week, if not every other day? Even as someone who knows that UX was so fundamental to founding the company, with a very small team, this concept of continuous discovery was hard to implement.

One thing our product leader talks a lot about is how proxies are not the real thing and we need to be very wary of proxies. There can be proxies for your users. You can also use process as a proxy for actual understanding. The larger an organization, the more easy it is to convince yourself to think that proxies equal direct user and buyer understanding.

Because of our earlier decision to not customize builds, we’ve been able to keep engineering and product teams relatively small and grow sustainably. This makes us much more nimble and allows us to introduce newer things like continuous discovery more easily.

We’re trying to interact with our users on a much more frequent basis now and that was one of the first things our VP of product wanted to do, so I’m seeing some of our earlier UX and strategy work come to fruition.

Founders should understand that there’s a distinction between exploratory user research and user testing. They are different threads of continuous discovery and both should always be going.

NG: I’m so happy you’re talking about continuous discovery. Most people think that discovery is something you do at the beginning of a product lifecycle–a one-and-done task. But you’re spot on–it is ongoing and needs to be ingrained within the ethos of a product team.

QW: Exactly, users evolve just like products evolve. For us, there are a lot of new features so I need to make sure I keep the information I know about my users up to date. That’s why continuous discovery is really really important.

✍️ Words of wisdom from Qian

NG: What general advice would you give to new founders who are trying to establish a strong foundational UX practice early on?

QW: You need to have a deep respect for your users and if you really care about them and solving their problem, you will naturally build UX around you.

What really helped us was having the desire to solve a real problem while having the humility to know that we don’t inherently know what our users want.

At Informed K12, before we knew all the UX techniques and tactics, that core user-centric model was there.

When founders are first starting a company, they should really question themselves. Are they starting the company because they have a fantasy of being a founder? Or are they really trying to solve a real problem?

The typical founder’s fantasy of thinking that they have this brilliant idea can really lead them down really bad paths.

NG: So true. Any parting words of wisdom?

QW: Having respect for your end users is core. Bring humility to every interaction with them and understand that you’re learning from people who have been a part of the communities that you’re trying to serve for a very long time.

💡10 Key Takeaways

1. An EdTech founder’s path is not always direct. Experience, knowledge, and drive come in many different forms.
2. Stay in the problem space. If you stay in the problem space, there’s no such thing as complete failure–there are only lessons learned.
3. Know who your buyers are and know who your end-users are. If they are not the same person, prioritize the end user first. Don’t try to design and build for everyone at once. Stay connected to the buyers and spend more time learning what is valuable to them.
4. Don’t conflate your problems. Break them down into smaller, bite-size things to solve in order of importance.
5. Ensure you’re getting expert UX and design guidance from the beginning to help you along each step of your growth journey.
6. Give yourself enough time to find true product-market fit. Be patient and keep learning from your users.
7. Establish core principles that are based on UX thinking and research.
8. Resist the temptation to prioritize short-term gains over long-term strategy.
9. Don’t be afraid to evolve. Be adaptable. As your product grows, your strategy must evolve along with it to support new needs.
10. Humbly respect your users.

Nicole Gallardo has almost two decades of experience designing digital products that grow businesses and serve communities. She is the Founder & Chief Design Officer at Founders Who UX, a leader in UX and product design committed to empowering growing companies with free resources, team training, and premium consulting services.

The UX of EdTech Community’s purpose is focused on helping UX practitioners who work on products and services that support learning. We also welcome educators and those in other disciplines looking to develop a UX mindset applied in the industry of education and future of learning and work.

Subscribe to our newsletter for more UX resources supporting EdTech startups.