GENERATIVE RESEARCH + SERVICE DESIGN
HYBRID HAUL TRUCK ANALYTICS for MINES
SYNOPSIS
Digital Analytics Dashboard supporting the Hybrid Electric conversion of a Mining Haul Truck
COMPANY / CLIENT
First Mode
CROSS FUNCTIONAL TEAMS
Product Management | Software Product Development | Modeling & Simulation
ROLE
Lead User Researcher | Service Experience Designer
BACKGROUND
First mode is an engineering product startup company aiming to decarbonize the mining industry. The approach is a hybrid electric truck trial program that converts existing diesel truck to capture and store downhill brake energy and reimplement it during normal driving. First Mode currently have partnered up with mine sites to deploy a Trial Hybrid Truck Program to further development efforts.
Given the trial program is conducted on customer site, we need to ensure that the site General Manager (GM) will be content with the hybrid truck’s progress throughout program’s duration.
Product team have hypothesized the following:
Design a Digital Dashboard Analytics tool that can inform the Site GM of the hybrid truck program’s key performance metrics.
Understanding that a Digital Dashboard is just one part of a Service Suite that will be needed in order to support the various parts of the Mine Operation Eco System, I added the following research objective:
Investigate & define the suite of service experiences to ensure the trial truck program continues to progress & achieve the Site GM’s performance goals.
“Hypothesis - Design a Digital Dashboard Analytics tool that can inform the mine site General Manager of the hybrid truck program’s key performance metrics. ”
PROBLEM STATEMENTS
“What are the hybrid truck’s success metrics that the mine site General Manager cares about?”
“What additional products & services should the Trial Truck Program incorporate in order to achieve the aforementioned metrics?”
Product team’s current assessment of the necessary products & services is incomplete. There are additional critical services aside from a Digital Analytics Dashboard aimed for the General Manager.
In order to identify the opportunities, we need to first understand the various additional stakeholders that will also have critical influences on the Trial Program’s success. We need to:
Identify the stakeholders
How do their job responsibilities contribute to the Hybrid Truck Program’s success?
Prioritize the urgency of stakeholder / needs over a product development time line
Formulate the appropriate products & services
CHALLENGES
“The mine is really an ecosystem comprised of specific operation branches & its respective stakeholders. Understanding & gathering insights from all the stakeholders involved will illustrate the holistic customer experience journey. This can then evolve into a service blue print with which we can identify the necessary products & services. ”
“Involving those on-the-ground users during the early product trial stages to really understand how your system works, that’s the key to successful new technology implementation.”
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY & COLLATERAL
An added challenge is the limited access to Customer Leadership Stakeholders. They often have limited time and are on time zones continents away. In response, I applied the following mixed method approach:
Audit existing product/user literature
Set up 10 qualitative interviews, 6 of which are a mix of internal stakeholders w/ extensive mine-site working experience and mine personnel from a nearby Washington Mine. This is to compensate for limited customer stakeholder access.
Composed first drafts of the following visual research collaterals in order to expedite user understanding of the research topics during interviews. I created these frameworks for the Junior Researcher to use as we collectively paint a more holistic picture of the Service Design experience.
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A tiled mock up made of analytic metrics. User Subjects can:
Interactively prioritize the metric tiles.
Thought exercise to see if any additional features / metrics are missing.
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Outline format rather than a rigid Questionnaire Script. Use Subjects tend to be more forthcoming with previously unthought-of topics if the conversation is more fluid, allowing them more freedom to speak their minds.
Also, goals of each engagement session are clearly listed. Sometimes the goal focuses more on building relationships for future engagement sessions rather than maximizing information gathering. This is especially true of complex product use-cases that requires multiple interview sessions.
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Framework to investigate:
What are all necessary service activities that lead to a positive quarterly review for the Mine General Manager?
Who are the additional users that will carry out these activities?
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Because User Subject access is limited we want to build up mutual trust. This outlines how we will go about building up the relationship so the user subjects better understand research’s impact and thus facilitate future access.
FINDINGS & ANALYSIS
Shown is an updated Service Map Progression reflective of the major research insights. (click to enlarge image)
PRIORITY 2 - DIESEL SAVING
PRIORITY 1
RESPONSIBLE STAKEHOLDER
PRODUCT OPPORTUNITY
CRITICAL REPORTING TIMELINE
TRUCK OPERATION UPTIME - Metric assessing Trial HEV Truck’s current operational capacity. Essentially, have we identified & fixed all of the Trial Truck’s initial operational bugs? Goal is to ramp back up to original Diesel Capacity so there is no loss of production.
First Mode Trial Manager - In close communication with all mine site operation branches & stakeholders in order to ensure the trial truck is operational.
Digital Dashboard that helps the Trial Manager keep track of the Truck’s various subsystems, such as energy, thermal, are in working order.
Months 0-2
DIESEL SAVING - Assess current reduction in diesel consumption.
Truck Driver - Brake Energy capture is contingent on Driver’s Brake application. New brake behavior training likely necessary.
Digital Product that helps train and optimize Driver’s brake application behavior in order to maximize energy capture.
Digital Dashboard that helps the Driver keep track of the brake energy capture and general behavioral performance
PRIORITY 2
RESPONSIBLE STAKEHOLDER
PRODUCT OPPORTUNITY
CRITICAL REPORTING TIMELINE
PRIORITY 1 - TRUCK OPERATION UPTIME
The following 2 metrics are the critical metrics that matter the most to the Site General Manager. Listed in order of priority,
Month 0-3
IMPACT
REVISION OF PRODUCT ROADMAP
Presenting the findings about the new stakeholders to the Product Manager allows the Manager to readjust the service/product scope and timeline. It is important to understand about the problem space early in the development process so there is ample time to address any unforeseen project blind spots.
NEW CRITICAL STAKEHOLDER IDENTIFICATION
We have identified additional users and how their respective job responsibilities contribute to the Trial Program’s success. This allows us to plan the next round of user research and also better define the comprehensive service program needed to achieve success for the Hybrid Truck Program.
With the newly unearthed insights, I worked with the Product Manager to devise a product development roadmap and separated the action items into Immediate and Near-term Product User Research action items.
ACTION ITEMS
IMMEDIATE
Analytics Dashboard for Mine Site GM
Investigate into the following research topics:
Product Definition Research on Analytic tool details. This will include identifying
Primary hierarchy of metrics
Site GM’s existing tools used for current Mine Performance evaluation.
Continue to build the trust & relationship with User Subject
NEAR-TERM
Note: All above UI mockups are co-developed with Camille Woodthorpe
Analytics Dashboard for FM Trial Manager
Hypothesis - The trial Manager will need a digital Interface connecting on-site stakeholders to internal Product Design team so everyone work together to troubleshoot & fix issues so the trial truck can remain operable.
Hypothesize & draft use scenarios for Trial Program’s first 6 month on site. This should start to identify the necessary product functionalities to help with the trial manager’s responsibility.
Digital Products for Mine Site Driver
Investigate into the following research topics:
What kind of behavioral training is appropriate & fits into the Driver’s existing work context?
Once the training approach is identified, the corresponding digital products will be evident.
Analyze the Energy capture process, exploring various optimization approaches such as:
User Behavior altering and optimization.
Technological approaches like reprogramming onboard brake system
As expected, this has turned into an all-encompassing service design project in which we’re defining the holistic customer experience. The Human Centered Design team took this research of Digital Analytics tool and reframed it as an opportunity to help leadership from both external Customer and Internal First Mode organizations realize how developing the entire Product Service Experience is critical to the HEV Program’s Success.
RETROSPECTIVE
Below are the projects that were derived from the research analysis action items.
RELATED PROJECTS
APPENDIX & IN-DEPTH FINDINGS
Shown is a comprehensive journey map of the holistic HEV Trial Program Journey that incorporates:
Users & Use Cases
Expectation of progress
Products, Digital/Services/Physical, that addresses the expectations
Methodology that aids the development process
*Notice that the resulting diagram is an amalgamation of the previously shown methodologies & collaterals. The diagram design is intended to grow and evolve with the research. It should become a toolbox that empowers the research audience, internal or external, grab the data bits and compile various points of view relevant to their specific inquiry. Essentially, it is a Design System Database of User Experience Research. Eventually, the Miro diagram becomes an outline for a Digital Database Product that can be prototyped with tools like Figma. The final aim is to make a easily accessible tool for our stakeholders to utilize in order to inform them of their product user needs.