Designing a Fair Play Golf Companion App
Work Type
Mobile App
Website
Date
Sep - Dec 2024
Total Time
3 Months
TL;DR
Eliminated score manipulation with real-time input
Prevent cheating with integrated real time ecosystem
Refined scoring flow after failed live test
Adopted by 1,000+ users
Background & Context
This work was quite challenging for me, i started this project knowing almost nothing about golf. The client managed a regional Yogyakarta golf community with monthly tournaments. On the surface, everything worked but behind it, a lot of things relied on trust, manual processes, and delayed reporting.
So before designing anything, I had to understand the game itself the rules, the flow, and how players actually behave on the course.
Problems
The client faced several critical operational and integrity issues on the course.
What was happening on the field:
Players could input scores after the game ended
Some colluded and manipulated results
Handicap data was outdated and unreliable
Operational issues:
Manual player pairing
Manual handicap calculation
Manual participant tracking
Manual membership management
Key Problems:
Unfair competition
Low trust in tournament results
Heavy admin workload
Slow, inefficient event management
Objectives
Reduce manual work
Improve accuracy of player data
Create transparency during tournaments
Prevent cheating, not just detect it
Constraint
During the brainstorming phase, we faced challenge
Golf isn’t simple.
Understanding the rules, scoring system, and terminology required multiple deep discussions with the client. But the real challenge appeared during the first live test.
The scoring flow didn’t work.
Players needed to input scores quickly while moving between holes, but the system was too slow and impractical.
Solutions
After multiple discussions with the client, we realized that inputting scores after every hole was too disruptive. Players were constantly moving, and frequent input would only slow them down and create frustration.
So we explored a more balanced approach.
Key Decision
Instead of forcing real-time input every hole, we introduced a system where scores are recorded every 6 holes. This way Players stay focused on the game, input feels lighter and less annoying, the system remains accurate and reliable.
This approach proved effective it was used in 20+ events, with no reported cheating incidents.
I designed a comprehensive digital ecosystem featuring Event Ticketing, Real-Time Scoring, Membership Management, a Real-Time Leaderboard, Digital Scorecards, and a Course & Golf Rules directory.
The main shift was simple instead of optimizing for accuracy alone, we optimized for speed in motion.
The scoring experience was redesigned to require minimal input steps, work quickly between holes, update instantly across the system. So scores weren’t something you entered later they became part of the game itself.
Iteration
Fixing what failed in the field, during the first live test, the scoring flow didn’t hold up. It was too slow and impractical for real conditions. So we immediately:
Evaluated the actual user journey on the course
Identified friction points during movement
Redesigned the flow to be faster and more intuitive
The updated version was specifically optimized for quick, real-time input in a moving environment.
Conclusion
The optimized scoring flow proved to be highly effective, precise, and efficient. The implementation of real-time data entry successfully eradicated the cheating problem, as any fraudulent score inputs were immediately visible in the system. Both the client and the customers were highly satisfied; the tournaments felt much safer and fairer, and the live leaderboard made the game more competitive and fun. The application was widely adopted, reaching over 1,000 users and tripling active memberships from 100 to over 300.
In the future, I’d love to integrate this with smartwatches so players don’t have to input scores manually and everything could be captured automatically.
