Authors: Stephanie Gannon, PhD, and Nevena Meier
“How can we design for what’s best for the customer?” is a question that often kicks off our Emerging Tech design and research discussions for what is next. Throughout the product development process, the Emerging Tech team keeps the customer at the center by valuing research-informed design. Emerging Tech’s charter is to deliver breakthrough capabilities that save customers time and money and enable associates and partners to quickly serve and delight customers anytime, anywhere. We work on platforms from Augmented Reality (AR) to conversational artificial intelligence (AI) experiences. Stephanie Gannon, PhD, leads research, and Nevena Meier leads the design team. Our collaboration not only involves nerdy discussions of design and psychology topics, but also our pets, family, and love of food as we support each other as working moms. In this article, we share how to maintain an open dialogue between research and design throughout a product’s timeline to deliver the best product to customers at speed.
Stephanie’s Experience — Research as the Customer’s Voice
I come from a research-heavy background, having earned my PhD in Cognitive Neuroscience at the University of Arkansas in 2021, but I was always interested in applying human research to real-world problems and using it to create actionable solutions. I interned at Walmart in 2020 and became passionate about applying my research skills to innovation and change that could affect the lives of millions of people. Once I joined Emerging Tech full-time, my job became equal parts innovation and research while working with skilled impact-seekers in product and design.
Research is integral to the product and design process across each developing platform in Emerging Tech, as it is essential to ensure we are solving true Walmart customer problems. The process starts with reaching out across the Walmart organization for any existing relevant resources, which helps us connect with other researchers throughout the business to stay up to date on strategic initiatives and build partnerships to work collaboratively with other teams. After conducting a project intake prioritization process, the selected projects vary across the product stages. Research is required at the beginning phases of a product to assess customer pain points and product market fit. Later, we test our assumptions during product development, and finally, we do evaluative testing of the designs to make sure the experience meets customer needs.
Throughout that process, our research team works with both design and product. Our design team leverages research to design the best experiences for our customers, and often we use their designs in testing. When I lead research, I maintain an objective view of the research plan, questions, and results to be the voice of the customer to design and product, highlighting any customer challenges with current solutions and pain points that reveal future opportunities. I communicate with Nevena early and often in the research process to make sure my findings answer questions to any hypotheses or assumptions needed to optimize the experience her team is designing for. Their takeaways lead to more research, and we continue to iterate together.
We work in fast-paced environments, so it is important that we are constantly in sync and test before, during, and after the product’s lifecycle. Utilizing tools like Zoom and Slack have helped us create an in-office environment virtually and keep us connected. Creating a consistent routine of meeting weekly using collaborative agendas maximizes our productivity. Implementing a culture where we emphasize continuous improvement by regularly evaluating our process and allowing flexibility to implement change has provided our strong foundation. We are constantly learning and growing together and have created a space that fosters recognition and appreciation for each other.
Nevena’s Experience — Design for the User
Early in my career starting as a graphic designer, I was always curious, constantly asking deeper questions to understand users’ behaviors and needs. It was no surprise when my focus naturally shifted from creating visual elements to designing interactive experiences. While accelerating my new passion for UX, I was introduced to Voice User Interface. The opportunity to work for Emerging Tech matched my skillset immediately where I started focusing on building conversational design experiences. From there, our team and products grew rapidly, and I began designing experiences for AR. This growth in products relies not only on a great product vision and plan (thanks to our amazing Product Managers) but also on relationships built by communication and trust. This is especially true for the relationship between Design and Research.
The products we create rely on thoughtful UX, and behind each great UX is great research. A commonality is keeping the customer, not the technology, at the center. Too often we assume we are the user, but with the help of research, we learn how users engage with technology and discover the right opportunities for it. For our product, “View in your home”, Stephanie conducted extensive user research using our high-fidelity designs to understand how users were interacting with our technology. We found that using real world situations like a user’s home environment, helped identify opportunities that otherwise may have not been apparent in a controlled testing environment. At first, users struggled with placing an item successfully in their space and if we didn’t test early on, the assumption of a user understanding that technology could have been a missed opportunity for one of our metrics of success in placing the item virtually in their space.
Every student of UX is taught to have empathy for the user. I have learned the importance of empathy that carries across to who we work with as well. Understanding each other’s roles and responsibilities helps us operate like a well-oiled machine. Design relies on research insights, and research understands what kind of information we need and when. These synchronizations did not happen overnight, but Stephanie and I built the foundation that carried through as our team continued to grow. We started by getting to know each other personally. I observed how Stephanie presented research findings and what types of questions she asked to understand how she gathers insights on user needs and behaviors. Stephanie created narratives around the data she presented to make it more relatable. She asked about users’ attitudes and feelings towards the product and presented findings objectively, without personal biases which made me quickly realize that Stephanie was as empathetic to the design team as she is to our customer. Our process focused on working towards a common objective: prioritizing our user. Before building a research plan, design and product align on the execution of the product and how we can best advocate for our users to create a product that both solves a need and is easy to use. With Stephanie’s experience and passion, she provides actionable insights with specific recommendations based on the data that leads to improvement in our products.
The Proof is in the Product
If you are interested in seeing the impact of our partnership, check out a few of our AR experiences including, “View in your home” and beauty “Try on” on the Walmart mobile app. Each of these aims to empower customers by allowing them to view products virtually when and where they need to. We are proud that both experiences are 2024 iF Design Award winners. Additionally, our speed has allowed us to match the pace of the industry and we collaborated on early concept Generative AI-based experiences using this technology to help shoppers, as is previewed in this clip from Good Morning America.
Emerging technology plays an integral part in driving our team’s mission; however, research and design will continue to prioritize understanding the needs of our customers. Maintaining a collaborative spirit, functional routines, and ongoing iteration ensures that we bring the best from our respective skillsets together. As our team grows, we are confident that our small team dynamic will contribute to an even more exciting future for Walmart Emerging Tech.
Doing Collaborative Research and Design in Emerging Tech to Innovate for Walmart’s Customers was originally published in Walmart Global Tech Blog on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.