Reducing complexity for tool testers in the automotive sector

Reducing the complexity for testers to setup new tools for their work with state of the art measurement software

Discovery

As we already have established relationships with several customers, it made sense for me to speak to three of our customers who required the need to set up tools in conjunction with ISO standards.

The most important customer for us is the tool manufacturer because they mainly conduct their tests according to international ISO standards. Visiting our customers in Germany helped us build up suitable user personas that we can use and further refine for other aspects of feature development.

I went ahead and spoke to three of our key customers with these profiles to gather their wishes and desires when integrating such a feature as ISO6789 into their tools. In general, they all told me the same thing that they wanted an easy way to configure this with a series of logical steps providing information when needed.

I worked on the concept of building a wizard to allow our customers to simply add the ISO6789 configuration to their tool. This idea came to me in part because the concept was being used successfully on other projects in the company. It, therefore, made sense to use the design we have in the design system and then modify it for the specifics of this project.

Define

Some considerations that follow a wizard-like format that were implemented before testing with the user.

Ideation

Some considerations that follow a wizard like format that were implemented before testing with the user.

Usability Testing

As we took the time to deeply understand the user needs and pains a the beginning of the project we had a decent oversight of the key issues involved.

Some problems however included the user being confused when presented with the ‘create new tool’ and ‘setup evaluation’ options because it wasn’t clear if this was the next step in the process or not. We realized that the design lacked consistency in terms of the ‘wizard’ like feel and needed to be better restructured to avoid ambiguity. WE also realsied the design in places that needed short inline explanations to clarify certain steps in the process.

A consideration for touchscreen devices was given thought as well as how the tooltips would work for this environment. • Even though the flow allowed the user to add an ISO or VDI standard for a tool, the user gave us insights about wishing to add multiple standards for one tool.

Customer Feedback

The changes that were implemented by the user after the testing session were met with positive results.

Our users greatly appreciated being involved in the process of the design and creation of such a feature and thanked us for taking all of their points into careful consideration. Furthermore, even though not all requests were implemented many of these requests will be gradually implemented throughout the course of the lifespan of the product.

I feel I have helped to make the lives of our users much easier and to save them time when setting up a new tool according to an important evaluation standard.

I want to work with you to solve your usability problems

If you are interested in a no obligations chat to find out how you can mximise user engagement, productivity then let’s talk.