Estimated reading time: 7 minutes
? Overview
Pick a digital customer experience that you know well. Then, choose to either a) extend that experience with a new offering or b) redesign the existing offering. You’ll do so through three primary components:
1. A comprehensive digital customer experience journey map 1. We’ll use UXPressia (free education account) to create these maps.
2. A prototype of a key element of the experience you’re (re)designing.
3. A Case Study in which you present a comprehensive overview of your final project, including the map and prototypes.
? Rationale
The purpose of this course is to gain expertise designing integrated multi-part digital customer experiences. This final project serves those goals in the following ways.
- Mapping such an experience is an excellent way to begin to apply the analytical skills we’ve developed in this course.
- Prototyping a new (or renewed) experience is an excellent way to practically consider what it looks like to design part of an experience with the broader ecosystem in mind.
- Writing about these two items, along with the research and analysis informing them, not only reinforces your learning but also leaves you with a sharable work product.
? Structure
One-page proposal (2 points, due Friday 5/24)
Draft a succinct, clear overview of your project. Specifically, describe:
- The digital customer experience you plan to (re)design
- The touchpoint you might prototype
- How you plan to contextualize this work in writing for your professional goals.
Submission
Submit as an entry in your learning journal Google Doc titled “Final Project Proposal.”
Rough draft (5 points, due Tutorial 2)
A complete draft of all three components of your final project (map, prototype, Medium post).
- Doneness > perfection for this stage. The goal here is to get your head around your project as a whole so that you can assess its state holistically.
- Learning the tools (especially UXPressia and Medium.com, but also your prototyping tools) is key.
- While perfection isn’t expected, a serious enough effort to make this stage worth everyone’s while is expected.
Submission
In an entry in your learning journal Google Doc titled “Final Project – Rough Draft,” share a link to your Medium post.
Project presentation (3 points, delivered Wednesday 6/5)
A short (2m45s – 3m15s), polished presentation of your work for this project, pre-recorded.
- You absolutely may (and probably should!) draw from your Medium.com post to guide your presentation’s structure and content.
- Focus on creating a compelling narrative of your project. A brief outline might go something like this:
- Quick general background info to get a smart layperson up to speed
- A short narrative of how you identified the specific experience to improve
- A brief overview of your process of working through the problem space via your CJM
- A guided tour of the highlights of your new/improved CX via your prototype
- Focus on creating a compelling narrative of your project. A brief outline might go something like this:
- Pre-record your presentation and be prepared to screenshare its playback during our class meeting.
- These tips (content somewhat, but especially technical) from our undergraduate SLAM event might be helpful.
- We recommend recording your presentation with Descript—this is a great FREE video editing tool that helps you create top-notch, polished presentations, and it’s as easy to use as Google Docs or Slides. Not into Descript? Here’s a guide to creating a standard screen recordings.
- Expect a question from me and perhaps one or two from your classmates after you play your video.
Submission
Upload to YouTube (unlisted, if you’d like!) and share link in your learning journal Google Doc titled “Final Project Presentation.”2
Final deliverables (20 points, due Wednesday 6/5)
Submission
Share your case study Medium.com link in your learning journal Google Doc as an entry titled “Final Project – Case Study.”
Case Study (5 points)
The Case Study satisfies your Emerging Media Dossier requirements for the course. As such, it should follow the format required by the EM Dossier:
- Title and Subtitle
- Consider this formula for your title: Project name + project scope + project/case study (i.e: Instagram Icon Redesign Project)
- Your subtitle should be a sentence or short phrase that tells your audience what the project/product was about. (i.e.: An app that helps you connect with other new students.)
- Project Date
- When did you work on this project (i.e.: Spring 2023, May 2024, etc.)
- Your Role
- If this was a group project, list your role. Otherwise, this step is optional.
- Project Overview
- A brief, scannable overview of the project goals and results. Include the tools/software used in this section. (Recommended length: 2 – 3 sentences.)
- The Problem
- What were the specific challenges, problems, or goals that this project attempted to meet? Consider user needs, technical constraints, etc. (Recommended length: 3 – 5 sentences.)
- The Solution
- Describe your method or process for creating this project, how you solved the specific challenges from the previous section, and describe the “why” behind your design/development decisions. This is the longest section, where you’ll include most of your process documentation (visuals) and highlights from the final deliverable. (Recommended length: as long as needed.)
- Results
- Success metrics, lessons learned, next steps for future iterations, etc. (Recommended length: 3 – 5 sentences.)
- Topics
- Medium.com allows you to tag your story with up to 5 “topics” that make your case study easier to find. One of these tags must be the course number (i.e.: NMIX6010, JRMC7012, etc.) as detailed above. In addition, you should also select 4 other relevant topics (ex. UX, SwiftUI, Design, etc). Watch this video for help
Additional considerations:
- Need help setting up your Medium? Watch this video!
- Your case study on Medium.com must contain links to (not just images of) both your journey map and your prototype. (Why? Medium’s embedded images often aren’t high-resolution enough to see all the details you’ve put into your work!)
- Demonstrating your process, not just the end result, is key.
- No specific word limits, though something more than 900 words and less than 1800 is probably on track.
- Your prose should be scannable, carefully proofread, and detailed/specific while still being concise. Be consistent in terms of tense (i.e.: past tense/present tense) and point of view. Employ section headings, bolding, and bullet points when necessary.
Map (10 points)
A comprehensive digital customer experience journey map to be created via UXPressia. Successful maps will:
- Give viewers a clear and comprehensive understanding of the experience you seek to create
- Highlight insights gained into touchpoint for improvement, within the context of why the existing offering is the way it is
- Follow rules of good design and copywriting.
- Here’s a link to some tips for getting started with UXPressia.
[ADD DETAILS RE: CURRENT STATE then SLIGHTLY MODIFIED FUTURE STATE maps]
Prototype (5 points)
Prototype a key element of the experience you’re redesigning. Prototypes may take any format you’d like, so long as they clearly and completely represent the elements of your experience.
- Focus on depth over breadth. An inch wide but a mile deep, not vice versa.
- Your aesthetics may or may not be beautiful; the clarity and completeness of your thought must be!
? Grading
One-page proposal (2 points):
- 2: Clear, complete description of all of the above
- 1.5: One area unclear or incomplete
- 1 : More than one area unclear on incomplete
- .5: Assignment turned in, but mostly unclear / incomplete
- 0: Did not turn in assignment
Rough draft (5 points)
- 5: All components complete, showing a sufficient level of effort across all three.
- 4.25: All components complete, but with effort lacking in one component.
- 3.5: 2 out of 3 components complete with sufficient effort or 3 components complete, but with only one showing sufficient effort.
Project Presentation (3 points)
- 3: Excellent content and delivery!
- 2.75: Content or delivery excellent, with the other being solid.
- 2.5: Content and delivery solid.
- 2.25: Content or delivery solid.
Final Deliverables (20 points)
Case Study (5 points)
- 4.7+: Excellent content and presentation.
4.4+: Content or presentation excellent, the other solid.
4.1+: Content and presentation solid.
3.8+: Content or presentation solid, the other weak.
Map (10 points)
- 9+: Competent work throughout, with outstanding execution in one or more areas.
- 8+: Competent work throughout
- 7+: Mostly competent work, with one or more areas of major weakness.
Prototype (5 points)
- 4.7+: Demonstrates complete and complex thought processes for a narrowly-defined portion of your chosen CX.
- 4.4+: Demonstrates complete or complex thought processes for a narrowly-defined portion of your chosen CX.
- 4.1+: Demonstrates complete or complex thought processes for a loosely-defined portion of your chosen CX.
Summary
| Assignment | Points |
| One-page proposal | 2 |
| Rough draft | 5 |
| Presentation | 3 |
| Map | 10 |
| Prototype | 5 |
| Case study | 5 |
| Total | 30 |
? Timeline
- Friday 5/24: one-page proposal due
- Tutorial 2: rough draft one due
- Wednesday 6/5: project presentations, final deliverables due