Hi I'm Philipp
I'm a Usability Engineer located in Germany, passionate to interact with users, identfy problems and create a better user experience.
I'm currently looking for a topic for my master thesis to round of my degree in Usability Engineering.
ONE WEEK SPRINT CHALLENGE
HOW MIGHT WE IMPROVE EXPERIENCE WHILE FLYING
Idea Generation, Design, Sketching, Hi-fi Prototyp, User Testing
Interviewing, Personas, Design, Paper Prototyping, Hi-fi Prototyping
EYE-TRACKING ANALYSIS OF MOODLE
FACTORIO USABILITY ANALYSIS
User Testing, Improvement Suggestions
Surveys, Persona, User testing, Formative Usability Test
ONE WEEK SPRINT CHALLANGE
PROJECT
In the course "Applied Research Project" we got the task to create a concept of a new product that brings people together with exchanging services and expertise.
"The most trusted community platform that connects people through exchange of services and expertise."
SPRINT QUESTIONS
With sprint questions we can define the extent of the product to identify potential problems and situations where the product could fail.
MAP
We create a map to get an overview of the product flow. To keep it short and simple we stick with the rule five to fifteen steps.
HMW - HOW MIGHT WE
We use "How Might We"'s to rephrase the problems as opportunities.
After collecting all HMWs we organise them in categories and topics. Each team member distributes three points to vote for the most important ones.
PICK A TARGET
We choose a target in the map to set our focus. We choose "discuss" and "review" because this are the parts where users directly interact with each other.
LIGHTNING DEMOS
We collect great solutions from a range of companies. Each demo is presented in three minutes each, good ideas are captured as small sketches.
FOUR-STEP SKETCH
With this method we can effectively create many possible solutions in a short amount of time. These sketches will be used in the next day.
Notes (20min): Everybody walks silently around the room and gathers notes.
Ideas (20min): Review your notes and build ideas.
Crazy 8s (8min): Fold a paper to create eight frames and sketch one idea in each frame.
Solution Sketch (30-90min): Everybody creates an small anonymous self-explanatory storyboard with three frames displaying the best ideas.
STICKY DECISION
To select the best ideas we use the following steps:
Art museum: Tape all solution to the wall, building a long row.
Heat map: Everybody will review each of the solutions and mark good ideas with one to three red dots.
Speed critique: Each sketch is reviewed for three minutes by the group. Discuss outstanding and important ideas.
Straw poll: Each person silently chooses their favourite idea with a large red dot.
Supervote: The decider chooses the top three sketches. These will be prototyped.
STORYBOARD
In groups we create a fifteen panel storyboard to display how the customer will interact with the product.
PROTOTYPE
USER TESTING
POSITIVE
Stories from other users are good.
Messaging / communicating with the other party is good to build trust.
Profile pictures are important for community & trust.
Skill-based suggestions are good. Two-way reviews help to create a sense of kindness and community.
NEUTRAL
Requirement to enter in the ID for safety reasons - Verification would add trust.
Some kind of human "vetting" mechanism is needed.
Notifications will help to increase engagement.
A method to share requests will increase reach.
NEGATIVE
Animations are too fast in the onboarding screens.
The sign-up point is not quite right, allow browsing first.
Questionable value of the offered helping.
Suggest skills / categories to add to profile, free text will be difficult to manage.
HOW MIGHT WE IMPROVE IN-FLIGHT EXPERIENCE
PROJECT
This project was created in cooperation with the german airline Lufthansa. Each team will come up with a concept to improve the in-flight experience. First we decided to limit the scope to the experience in the plane. The topic itself was left open for us to choose.
USER RESEARCH
INTERVIEWS
We conducted interviews with passengers at Düsseldorf airport to identify potential experience problems.
13
92%
76%
54%
Users interviewed
Positive experiences
Feel good or tired
Wish for Wi-Fi
PERSONAS
Using the qualitative and quantitative data we collected from the interviews, we create multiple personas to empathise with the users.
BEN BORED
Flies long distances and gets bored easily, wants to have information or activities.
"The only way to never get bored is to never stay in the same place for too long"
25, single, male
Hates layovers, thinks that long flights are a waste of time, doesn't like reading very much, likes travel documentaries and movies from all parts of the world.
Wants to temporarily live in as many countries as possible.
Very impatient, easily bored, spends money on what he thinks is essential, needs activity and likes to go around.
FREDDY FAMILYGUY
Always books in groups of five, has three small kids, wants entertainment for the kids
Travels with his wife and kids "We fly at least two times per year."
45, married with kids
Flying is the best way to visit his wife's family across the globe, sometimes it's hard to keep the kids busy during long flights; They get really impatient and complain about not having fun stuff to do.
(think about it) Wants to take good care of his family without being really stressed out about it, would like the kids to have some fun without too much hassle.
Has a big heart, likes to talk to people, tries to make his kids more independent and would love them to have some fun during the flight - and for them to learn something new whilst doing so would be a great plus.
NADJA NOVICE
Has never been on a plane before, very nervous, want's a lot of information.
"I hope I dont mess things up and end up lost on this planet."
16 year old girl
Flying is a whole new experience for her, always dreamt of travelling the world but her parents were too afraid to let her go on her own.
She wants to know more about the aircraft, what's going on in the cockpit and would always like to keep track of the flight. She would also like to get useful information about her destination.
Very enthusiastic, wants to practice her English, looks forward to traveling more in the future - which depends on her first time's experience.
DESIGN
PROCESS
We divide the process into small steps and add emotions to empathise with the passengers. Based on these emotions we stated "How Might We" questions to address these feelings and improve the experience of the users.
STORYBOARDS
We use a storyboard displaying how the passenger could interact with the system to further empathise with the passengers. This storyboard will be used to create the prototypes.
USER FLOW
To get an overview of the functionality and the possible navigation, we create a user flow to ensure that the user can navigate through the app as fast as possible.
PROTOTYPING
PAPER PROTOTYPE
We create paper prototypes to get fast user flow and design feedbacks.
HI-FI PROTOTYPE
We create a moodboard for inspiration to create the hi-fi prototype.
The goal in this course was to create a concept and show it in a hi-fi prototype. In a real project user testing and adjustments of the prototype would be the next steps.
EYE-TRACKING ANALYSIS OF MOODLE
PROJECT
Moodle is a online platform many students use to see their courses and to access their course materials. Though students use this platform daily, many student have problems finding specific information. With this study we want to identify possible problems and how to address them. We decided to conduct an eye-tracking study to analyse how students navigate through the page.
USER TESTING
We design five common tasks that students typically perform. While creating the tasks we build theories for possible problems.
KEY FINDINGS
It was not clear to the majority of users where to find the overview for all courses.
If your language setting is English, you still see German names before the English ones. This confuses many English-speaking participants.
Users expect the text "My Courses" to be a button, which it is not.
Finding detailed information in the user profile yields mixed results. A few participants easily find the settings, while others take a long time and get lost.
IMPROVEMENTS
After analysing all findings we propose possible changes to prevent problems and make it easier for students to navigate through the page.
CHANGES
Home is renamed to "My Courses".
The old "My Courses" is renamed to "All Courses", now a link.
To remove content on the page, we removed the "Main Menu" and news on the right side and added "Site News" on the left.
Removed German names on English language profiles.
FACTORIO USABILITY ANALYSIS
PROJECT
Factorio is a highly rated video game about building and automising a factory. To be able to play the game efficiently, a good usability for the UI is very important. I contacted the developers and offered to conduct a usability evaluation for the game. I analysed the main menu and the settings, the map generator, the technology GUI, save & load dialogs and the train GUI.
IDENTIFYING THE USERBASE
PERSONA
I survey Factorio players to build a persona. Based on the limited data I only create one persona.
John Smith
"I like building and designing to solve challanging problems."
Demographics: 25 years old, single, from USA, Bachelor Student in IT.
Goals: Find new challenges in problem solving, building and designing.
Motivations: Express logical thinking in games. Find games that resemble the process of programming.
Pain Points: Spend less time in UI, more in-game. Focus fully on challenges.
Likes: trains, building and designing, complex problem solving, optimisation.
Interests: Programming, Gaming, Music, reading.
Games: Minecraft, Romworld, Civilisation, Kerbal Space Program, Crusader Kings 2, Subnautica, Cities Skylines.
47
47%
42%
14%
Participants
20-30 years old
Bachelor students
Field is IT
USER TESTING
1. EXPERT REVIEW
I conduct an expert review to find first usability problems and to build theories for potential problems.
2. OPEN QUESTIONING
I talk to four participants who do not know the game and let them freely discover the UI elements while thinking aloud.
3. EXPERIENCE INTERVIEW
I ask the participants about the UI elements to confirm previous results or to find new insights.
4. FORMATIVE USABILITY TEST
To identify further problems I ask participants to perform certain tasks and observe their behaviour.
SUMMARY
I list all occuring problems in a ranking system from 1 (marginal) to 5 (critical problem). I offer a possible solution for the problems and presented these to one of the developers.
CONTACT
If you would like to get in contact me, feel free to use one of the methods below.