Smart Access for the Market Nobody Designed For

Smaller residential buildings sit in an awkward gap. Without front desks, IT support, or physical infrastructure, residents, property managers, and delivery drivers are all stuck with physical keys and manual processes. Over 10 weeks I led research and end-to-end design for myQ Sentry, Chamberlain's app-based access platform targeting this underserved market.

Research covered 12 interviews and 250 surveys across all three user groups, plus a competitive audit of 6 access systems. The three groups had genuinely different needs from the same door: residents wanted digital keys and guest access controlled from their phone, managers needed remote provisioning and visibility without being on-site, and delivery drivers needed first-attempt entry without contacting anyone. Every design decision resolved that tension differently for each group.

The access panel itself had no touchscreen, only three physical buttons. That hardware constraint forced a tight information hierarchy that carried through the entire mobile experience. The mobile app handled resident keys, time-limited guest passes, and entry alerts. A management dashboard gave property managers live access logs and remote credential control. The validated MVP was presented to roughly 100 employees at Chamberlain's Global Innovation Team, including executive leadership.