HCLTech

The idea behind the project for this one came into being from my time at home, during COVID.

Watching my grandparents try to navigate their smartphones was equal parts heartbreaking and frustrating. They'd only ever used feature phones before, and suddenly they were expected to attend Zoom calls, update apps, and figure out why their camera wasn't working.

No manual, no guide, just a touchscreen and a lot of confusion.

I figured someone should build something for that. So I did.

At HCLTech, I got the opportunity to turn that thought into an actual project. The goal was simple: a Flutter application that gives elderly users a friendly, accessible reference for navigating their smartphones and performing everyday tasks with confidence.

Flutter was the right call here, (which is a rare statement in itself.) Cross-platform meant one codebase, wider reach, and less friction getting it onto the devices that actually needed it. We worked in an Agile setup, which kept things iterative and grounded in actual usability rather than assumptions about what the user needed.

The interesting design challenge was that the user base wasn't going to be particularly forgiving of poor UX. If it wasn't immediately intuitive, it had already failed.

That forced a level of intentionality around every interaction that I genuinely didn't expect from what seemed like a straightforward project on paper.

What started as watching my grandparents struggle with a smartphone taught me more about user-centred design than any textbook could.

The best software is the kind that makes someone feel capable, not confused.

It's a project I'm genuinely proud of, precisely because the motivation behind it was real and through this I got to actually help people I care about with something they use every single day (their smartphones I mean, not my app.)

Got my certificate for this one, right here.