Designing solutions & strategies for local taxi operators
Methods Used: Empathy Map, Persona, Journey Line, How Might We, Braindumping, Affinity Mapping, Post it Voting, Storyboarding, Low Fidelity Prototyping, Business Model Canvas
The group was divided into twelve teams. Each team was asked to examine different customer segments that use the services of Taxi & Taxi aggregators and detail a user persona for it, with relevant motivations and challenges.
Each team interviewed select users from its assigned customer segment to get a sense of both context and environment.
Participants also understood a day-in-the-life of the user to map a journey line for the persona. In the process, they identified key touch points around their commute and challenges with the specific mode of transport.
The groups looked at the challenge from the perspective of different personas – an upcoming career woman worried about safety, senior citizens, person with a sales job that requires multiple stops, folks with limited English language capabilities etc.
For each persona, teams identified a Point-of-View statement which were then used to frame the How-Might-We statements.
With the How-Might-We statements articulated, the teams started generating and building ideas. They went in for quantity. Some of the ideas focused on reconfiguration of the vehicles to make them more comfortable or add security features, building Apps that allow for standardized rates (vis-à-viz surge pricing), enable digital payments, local language support, focus on training of drivers, offline booking etc.
Subsequently, they used affinity maps to identify themes. Finally, they prioritised solutions using methods like Post It Voting and the Prioritization Matrix. The top ideas was then taken ahead for prototyping.
The teams prototyped their top ideas by creating storyboards and/or Lego models. They were asked to evaluate elements like ecosystem, interactions as well as static and interactive objects while designing the prototype. While being focused on the consumer need, they were also asked to think through the business viability and technological feasibility of their prototypes. In the process they built out a Business Model Canvas for their prototype by identifying the capabilities required, key partners, cost structures and revenue streams, amongst other aspects. They were asked to test their prototypes with actual users and gather currency or commitment for the solution. They were asked to further refine their solution/ prototype based on the feedback received using testing.