Delta Crew Application
A redesigned application to help flight crew manage their busy schedules.
Date: 2017
Client : Delta Air Lines
Delta Airlines employs a fleet of crew members that is 30,000 strong. They needed an app that would be as mobile as their employees to handle scheduling and on-rotation duties.
Key Challenges
The amount of data consumed by crew members is vast and highly technical. How do we as designers know when to use plain language and when to get granular?Crew members are always on the move, working varying schedules from diverse locations. How do we meet users where they need the app? How can this app ease the pain points of performing administrative functions on a mobile device and on-the-go?
When time came for Delta Airlines to update their Crew application for pilots and flight attendants to manage their schedules and check-in to their flights, they brought our team in to handle the project.
My team conducted extensive user research, journey mapping, design and integration into the development team.
Research
One of the key pieces of research performed on the CMA project was a shadowing opportunity at the Delta crew lounge located at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson Airport. The crew lounge is one of the main hubs of crew activity before, after and between flights. The ability to observe crew at work helped the team piece together journey maps that depicted where crew members were interacting with Delta apps and software throughout their rotations.
In addition to shadowing, we had the opportunity to meet with and interview a number of other employees who make use of crew scheduling apps such as managers, IT, scheduling center employees and flight leaders.
Through the research and interviews, we were able to get a clearer pictures of where, when and how users were currently engaging with apps to help us identify pain points and see where they would want to engage with apps in the future.
The Process
After analyzing our research and interviews, it became clear the app needed to adhere to four key tenets:
- Flexibility: Give users a great experience across platforms and allow them the flexibility to interact with the app where they want.
- Scalable: Design the app in such a way that future features and iterations can be added easily.
- Intuitive: Make the users’ job easy to do by focusing the design around the flight crews’ needs.
- Vital: Surface what is most pressing for crew members depending on where they are in rotation. Give them their next activity without overwhelming them with information.
Tasks:
Research, Prototyping, Design, Testing + Development integration
