Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles, 2019 - internship

Connect Fleet

OVERVIEW

Duration | 6 months + 4 months while working on bachelor thesis

Things I learned | communication of design concepts, prioritizing, working with design systems, creating flow-diagrams, user testing, stakeholder management, working with developers, pixel-perfect UI design, further knowledge & experience about design thinking processes, software (ex. Sketch, InVision)

Challenges | work-life balance

The most fun | team work, taking responsibility, independently working on the UI of the We Connect Fleet Android App

During my time at Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles I mainly worked on the digital fleet management system We Connect Fleet and was in charge of the visual design of the Android App used by driver. The App as seen below is available at the Google Play Store.

My experiences...

1. UI of the We Connect Fleet Android App - working closely with Katharina Felski, Head of UX, I was able to create a new visual design for the Android App using material.io which is currently available in the Play Store

2. Usability Tests - creation of prototypes in Sketch & InVision, conducting the tests as presenter & recorder

3. Post-concepting care - working closely with developers to ensure the best user experience possible

4. SCRUM & its responsibilites - due to SCRUMs interdisciplinary and agile character I learned how to communicate design concepts, argue about usbaility and the overall user experience

5. Workshops - UX and UI are still young and widely unknown diciplines - to improve the understanding of everybody interested our team organized a UX/UI basics workshop to share the mentality. Using the banana analogy we underlined what gooooood UX really means :)

6. User Research - In the spirit of user research a colleague and I went on an exhibition to munich. Apart from sitting in the I.D. Buzz cargo concept car we conducted interviews and were busy gaining insights

...in pictures

"

We work in symbiosis - the development of products only works in interdisciplinary teams.

Katharina Felski, Head of UX, Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles

Key Learnings

1. Gratefulness

I am deeply grateful to have gotten the chance to be a part of those amazing individuals. Especially my mentor Katharina Felski was a great support during this experience and is a specialist in her field. I learned a lot and am very happy to have had the responsabilities my team trusted me with.

2. Passion for UX / UI

Design is not just "making something beautiful". To realise its problem-solving potential has opened my eyes even more and increased my passion for this specific field. It is crucial to listen to users and work human-centered - which is also a lot of fun.

3. An interdisciplinary work environment is gold

Learning and sharing knowledge makes everyone a "better" person. It's about working together, being a team, achieving something together. Stagnation is never good.

4. Buzzword bingo

Low-hanging fruits? Quick-win? ...be careful to use them wisely and be precise with the message you want to communicate.

5. Hello gamechanger

Work experience is amazing, also because it helps to realise own goals and supports in personal development.

6. The empty backlog

Some people fear it, some people are excited by it - the empty backlog. I believe it basically means that there is time to check the usabilty, do some research, write improvement tickets and further improve the overall user experience. So to wrap it up: It's a chance.

Any questions? :) - leave a message

design@inkenalber.de