Nuance Mix
A development platform that enables businesses and people to connect to our technologies in ASR, NLU, dialog, and AI, as well as tools to build their own natural language interfaces.
The challenge
Mix is a big program with challenges and opportunities spanning design, technology, process and product management. This page is a very high-level overview of how our user research efforts impacted our tools and process.
Mix.nlu
When Mix.nlu was released, it was engineering driven - including the interface. The tool had powerful capabilities, and a controversial feedback button.
After release, the team discovered that model completion rates by users were very low - people were having a hard time using the tool. The program brought us (UX) in to figure out why, and how to help. We did in-depth user observations, worked with people at hackathons, and started participating in pre-sales customer engagements. From this, we got a sense of how users understand NLU, of their workflows and of pain points within the tool. We redesigned the tool, and re-released it in beta. We added user education around both NLU and the tool, in the form of videos, tutorials, and sample projects. We implemented a Contributor's program to continue our research, which led to the creation of a Usability backlog - feature requests and improvements that are now a primary driver of our tool's evolution.
Mix.edu
I created videos, tutorials, and other content to communicate best practices around designing and building natural language applications. Mix.edu is not released yet, but these are among the most highly requested materials from our sales team.
Mix.dialog (currently in internal beta)
At the moment, we're preparing to release Mix.dialog. Here, the processes we put in place for user research are driving our post-beta roadmap and investment in our most forward-looking interaction paradigms.
My roles
I play multiple roles on Mix. I'm responsible for user research for the program. I lead Mix.dialog, setting priorities and direction for new features and for stabilizing/improving existing ones (i.e., product management spanning front- and back-end), specifying requirements, and producing wires. On Mix.nlu, I created the Usability backlog, and continue to manage front-end priorities and requirements, and contribute to design. I also lead content and direction for user education and best practices.