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I started in May as a UX Designer summer trainee in the Wärtsilä Voyage Rapid Innovation team. In this role, I developed my skills in UX/UI and using design system, as well as learned about the Marine Industry. To support my learning, I was given one project where I participated not-intensively in interviews and briefings with my colleague and one project for leading and making decisions.
Rapid Innovation Team focuses on designing new products and services, which are based on real-life onboard and onshore experiences. They are tested and evaluated together with customers before starting the fully committed R&D work.
The goal was to test a hypothesis of a new concept that helps to reduce training on shore and increase the possibilities to train the new product for the crew on the vessel itself.
After a short introduction to the role and the project, during the first two weeks, I was given a task to create a prototype for an upcoming interview with bridge officers and prepare the interview questions. I could not attend the interview myself, but I carefully watched the recording prepared by my colleague. I learned that I know nothing about the project. It was a key moment for me and I initiated User Study to get a better understanding of my users and at the same time to deepen my knowledge in the Marine industry. I liked that I have the freedom and trust to lead the project on my own.
I conducted different stakeholders to set up numerous interviews. All interviews were held online. After I analyzed the interviews, I understood better what are user needs and the opportunities for Wärtsilä. Based on the results of the user study, I created a Business Model Canvas to list customer segments and key propositions that will make a customer happier. After interviewing my colleagues who have a marine background I summarized the data in form of a training journey map of an officer. The next step was to identify what was needed for a reliable and efficient training application for all involved stakeholders: end users, customers and Wärtsilä. From this step forward I was able to better define the features and functions of the product and create all possible user flows and scenarios. Based on all the collected data I started to design a low-fidelity prototype in Figma by using the Wärtsilä design system.
Every week I was updating the project status in Asana (a project management tool) and presented it to the whole team, including the product owner. I worked alongside a great team of service and UX designers, software developers and technical architects. The teammates supported me and answered my questions whenever I need. In addition, we had weekly and bi-weekly meetings for all designers in Wärtsilä with colleagues from Poland, Sweden, Singapore, UK and Poland.
At the end of the summer, my contract was extended, and I got an opportunity to continue as On-call UX Designer Trainee in the same team on a part-time basis (100 working hours per month). Also, it was agreed that I can write a thesis for Wärtsilä and use the data that I have collected during my traineeship.
In September together with 2 colleagues, I visited Aboa Mare (Maritime Academy and Training Center, located in Turku, Finland) to conduct 7 interviews with maritime professionals and our customer, Royal Caribbean Cruise Line. During the interview, I used the hypothesis approach, open-ended questions and empirical part was based on my Figma prototype. After I analyzed the feedback, presented it to the team and upgraded interfaces in Figma accordingly.
For the last timebox of the year, I set up the goal for my project to conduct comparative testing. Comparative testing is meant to act as a bridge from my empirical part to the research part of the thesis and provide me with a tangible comparison between my training concept and currently used methods. I invited users with maritime background and prepared questions in the form of strongly disagree and agree that will help to measure how easily/ faster/ more comprehensive users get acquainted with an application after reading manuals and using my concept app. Currently, I am analyzing the results.
Summing up, this traineeship gave me a unique opportunity:
to obtain professional experience in UX/UI design within a big international corporation.
decide and follow on the actions to achieve the goal.
align with a user and stakeholder needs and wants, including business goals.
practice Finnish skills with my colleagues though the company’s language is English.
I am glad that I felt confident about things I know and stayed curious and had the courage to ask if I did not know something.
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