User Experience Professional
Tesla
Journeys
General Assembly
With COVID-19 work-from-home orders drastically reducing the commute of its target demographic, Tesla would like to reposition its cars as great recreational drivers. By leveraging strengths in safety and innovations in self-driving technology, we aim to design an experience for current and future Tesla automobile owners that rivals every other in luxury travel.
This project was a class assignment at General Assembly; I am not affiliated with Tesla Inc.
Goal: Conduct user research to understand how Telsa drivers, passengers, and Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) imagine spending time in a self-driving vehicle and build a tool that enhances the current roadgoing experience.
Results: An in-car trip-planning app providing a curated tour along scenic routes rather than delivering the most energy-efficient route.
Project Scope
Role: UX Researcher
Client: a class project
Project Type: In-car Touchscreen application
Project Length: 2 weeks
My Contribution: User Research, Persona, Usability and Prototype Testing, User Flow, Journey Map, Sketches
Tools: Pen & Paper, Miro, Figma, Google Workspace, Trello
GOALS
What we aim to contribute:
Generative Research Goals
• Understand users' experience with self-driving vehicles.
• Understand how users would spend time reclaimed traveling via self-driving car.
• Learn what users imagine personal transportation will be like in fifteen years.
Design Research Goals
• Understand our target users' workflow when engaging and disengaging Tesla's Autopilot feature.
• Imagine our users' interactions with a fully autonomous vehicle.
• Discern what our users constitute as a luxury travel experience.
RESEARCH
Secondary Research
In 2019, Audi researched the "influence of rational arguments, emotions, values, and lifestyles on attitudes to autonomous driving." The study found that of 21,000 respondents from China, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the USA, 53% want to test autonomous driving (Audi MediaCenter, accessed May 13, 2021).
Note: While Tesla's Autopilot and Full Self-Driving (FSD) are not self-driving technologies, we used these indicators to look at how we could use today's technology to bridge tomorrow's innovations.
In-Depth Interviews
We would have liked to connect with Tesla drivers and conduct field studies to see how drivers interact with Autopilot and FSD. But, unfortunately, social distancing recommendations due to the COVID-19 pandemic prevented seizing such an opportunity.
Instead, I held four (4) in-depth interviews with Tesla drivers and passengers to get feedback on their experience with Autopilot. Additionally, we interviewed two (2) SMEs about how their companies (insurance and consumer research) think about a future with self-driving cars. I sorted their responses into an affinity map.
Affinity Map: User Interviews
Crucial Insight
Users want to focus on work or sleep; others desire to direct their attention to family or the sights they pass by on longer journeys.
Three of the four users interviewed cited feeling safe enough to sleep in the car as an indicator of trust in autonomous driving technology. Another more pressing daily commuting need is catching up on or preparing for work.
However, attitudes shifted when interviewees considered road trips. Two users and one SME preferred to devote their attention to their travel companions or to learn about the sights they passed. These findings suggest that participants still see the road trip as a space for connection and to continue to satisfy their natural curiosity about the world outside their windows.
Meet Jo
Reflecting the above insights is our user, Jo. Looking to use their Model 3 for family road trips, using Autopilot and FSD for extended journeys prompts a novel question for Jo, the family's designated driver.
Namely, what will I do while the car is driving itself?
Affinity Map: User Interviews
Creating problem and solution statements
I wrote a problem statement reflecting Jo's needs:
Jo needs a way to learn to enjoy their Tesla's self-driving features because they currently feel like all of the focus is on navigating rather than appreciating their surroundings.
Next, we explored "How might we" statements to address Jo's needs. The most promising asked:
How might we reimagine the touchscreen to refocus on the journey, not necessarily the drive?
After a brainstorming session and a discussion with our instructors, my partner and I came to the following solution:
We believe that by inviting drivers to a curated route - complete with information on bookmarked Points of Interest along their trip - we will encourage drivers to refocus on their surroundings, fellow passengers, and the journey.
DESIGN
Trip planning is ripe with opportunity
Many Tesla drivers interviewed reported high satisfaction with the Autopilot and FSD experience. For example, drivers reported feeling more "secure" driving on freeways with Autopilot active than when they drove manually.
So, I created a journey map to track Jo's actions from departure, engaging Autopilot and FSD, to arrival, and diagramed the overall increase in their mood.
User Journey Map
The user journey map identifies three moments to improve Jo's journey:
1. When entering the car and selecting a destination,
2. When approaching a point of interest or the destination, and
3. When arriving at the destination
TESTING
Some testing is better than no testing
Many Tesla drivers interviewed reported high satisfaction with the Autopilot and FSD experience. For example, drivers reported feeling more "secure" driving on freeways with Autopilot active than when they drove manually.
With time running out, my partner and I secured three (3) usability tests on our medium or high-fidelity prototypes. The test determined that users should be able to select and interact with various points of interest (POIs) along their road trip from along the Pacific Coast Highway. Selection should take less than a minute, and interactions should encounter no errors.
The test asked users to complete the following tasks:
1. Set your destination to San Francisco, CA,
2. Choose from a list of POIs,
3. Learn more about Solvang, CA, and
4. Import a list of activities in San Francisco to your phone.
Lessons from iterations
During the first round of usability tests, our users expressed the desire to view an image and a quick description for points of interest, which led to the implementation of carousel cards.
The medium-fidelity prototype shows points of interest as a list. The high-fidelity prototype uses carousel cards to preview Points of Interest. (Outline added for emphasis.)
Our second round of usability tests led to more evident call-to-action buttons with skip and save functions, the ability to consume additional content with a "More" button, and recognizable point-of-interest icons.
The medium-fidelity prototype shows original CTAs and point-of-interest icons. The high-fidelity prototype uses improved CTAs, a "More" button, and familiar point-of-interest icons. (Outline added for emphasis.)
PROTOTYPE
Go on a Journey
Open the Journeys prototype and follow Jo and their family as they see all the sights on their Pacific Coast Highway road trip from Orange to San Francisco.
User Journey Map
RESEARCH IMPACT
Exploring new roads
Strategic Impact
• Focus on implementing a curated tour with a selection of points of interest en route to your destination.
Product Impact
As the current in-car trip planning app is a feature of most Tesla models, we saw the whole vehicle as the product. As such, please consider the following:
Go Anywhere. The current in-car trip planning app navigates the most efficient long-distance route along Tesla's Supercharger Network. Journeys would need to solve for points of interest and Supercharger locations - combining the two when possible - opening new roads for Tesla owners who wish to take the scenic route.
Voice integration/narration. Most Tesla models are voice-enabled. Similarly, our research shows users prefer to consume point-of-interest information aurally.
Storage. Storing point of interest information downloads to vehicles when a Journey begins; additional storage may be necessary to save favorite points of interest.
REFLECTIONS
Be daring, but also test designs with more users
I am proud of my partner and my work presenting to "stakeholders" and our classmates. I do feel we could have spent more time optimizing our MVP to make everything look better or work better for our imagined user, Jo. Nevertheless, my most important takeaways were:
• Do more A/B testing of the bold design Journeys takes.
• When you lose a partner, scope checks are your friend.
• Interview more Tesla drivers' reactions to modifying the UI they have grown accustomed to using.
• When a project excites you, bring your whole self to work - your team and work will benefit.
Thank you for reading!