calvana/PERSONA_ANALYSIS.md

CharityRight Admin — Persona Analysis & Journey Design

The Real Users (Not What the Code Assumes)

Only 2-3 people actually use this admin panel regularly:

1. Sahibah Ali — Supporter care / operations (last active 2 weeks ago)
2. Jasmine Begum — Operations / fundraiser management (last active 2 weeks ago)
3. Omair — Technical oversight (Superadmin)

128 accounts have Superadmin role, but 120+ are dormant test accounts, old staff, or event-specific accounts created years ago.

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Persona 1: "Sahibah" — The Supporter Care Person

Who she is: A charity staff member who handles donor inquiries. When someone emails donations@charityright.org.uk or calls asking about their donation, she needs to help them.

Her real questions (not what the admin shows her):

• "Someone emailed saying their donation didn't go through — can I find it?"
• "A donor wants to change their regular giving amount — where is their subscription?"
• "Someone wants a copy of their receipt — can I resend it?"
• "A donor says they donated £50 but only see £45 — what happened?" (admin fee)
• "Someone wants to cancel their monthly giving"
• "A donor wants to claim Gift Aid — did they tick the box?"
• "How many donations did we get today?"

Her pain right now:

• She has to search Customers, then click Edit, then scroll to the Donations tab, then find the donation, then click it — 4 clicks just to see someone's donation
• She can't search by donation reference number from the main search
• She can't see at a glance if a donor has Gift Aid enabled
• There's no way to add a note saying "Called on 4 March, wants refund"
• She can't see a donor's total lifetime value
• The dashboard shows her system metrics she doesn't understand

What she WANTS when she logs in: → A search box. Type an email. See everything about that person. Done.

Persona 2: "Jasmine" — The Campaign Manager

Who she is: Manages fundraising campaigns and reviews the fundraiser queue.

Her real questions:

• "Did anyone create a new fundraiser page today?"
• "How is the Ramadan campaign doing?"
• "Which fundraisers are raising the most right now?"
• "Is there spam in the queue?"
• "How much total did we raise this month?"
• "I need to set up donation pages for the new Qurbani campaign"

Her pain right now:

• The fundraiser queue (84 pending) is overwhelming — she doesn't know which ones to look at first
• She can't see a leaderboard of top fundraisers
• She has to check individual fundraisers one by one
• No way to see campaign performance at a glance
• The "Appeals" name means nothing to her — she thinks of them as "fundraising pages"

What she WANTS when she logs in: → A dashboard showing campaign health. The queue auto-sorted by urgency. A leaderboard.

Persona 3: "Omair" — Technical Admin

His real questions:

• "Is anything broken?"
• "Are payments going through?"
• "Is the Engage sync working?"
• "Are emails being sent?"

His pain: He doesn't use the admin panel for daily work — he goes to Stripe, server logs, etc. The admin panel doesn't show him system health.

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What the Admin Currently Shows vs What Users Need

What Admin Shows	What Users Need
"Customers" table with 21K rows	"Look up a donor" search box
"Donations" table with 30K rows	"Today's donations" + donor-linked view
"Approval Queues" table	"New fundraisers to review" with AI pre-sorted
Empty dashboard	At-a-glance: money today, pending tasks, problems
15 navigation items	3-4 things they actually click
"Event Logs" with 2.2M rows	"Is anything broken?" yes/no
"Scheduled Giving Donations"	"Monthly supporters" with health status
Separate "Users" and "Customers"	Unified donor profile

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The Journey Redesign

Morning Login — "What happened while I was away?"

Current: Blank page → navigate to something Should be: Dashboard that TELLS you what needs attention

"A donor just called" — Find & Help

Current: 7 clicks across 3 pages Should be: Type name/email in global search → see full donor profile → act

"Review new fundraisers" — The Queue

Current: Open list → click each one → read → decide → go back → repeat Should be: AI-pre-sorted list → most important first → approve/reject inline → done

"How are we doing?" — Performance

Current: Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Should be: Revenue chart, top fundraisers, campaign health, donor count

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Design Principles for the Rebuild

1. Answer questions, not show tables. "How much did we raise today?" → Show the number, not a filtered table.
2. One search to rule them all. Cmd+K finds donors, donations, fundraisers — by any field.
3. Surface problems, don't hide them. Failed payments, spam fundraisers, broken syncs → badges, alerts.
4. Use the language they use. Not "Appeals" but "Fundraising Pages." Not "Customers" but "Donors."
5. Anticipate the next action. After viewing a donor, offer: "Resend receipt" / "Add note" / "View in Stripe."