Describe your top 3 favorite products and why. Products can be hardware or software, for example, a chair, hairdryer, etc.

Describe your top 3 favorite products and why. Products cannot be hardware or software. Example: it could be a chair, hairdryer, etc.

1.       The first one is easy for me.  I love my vintage 1940’s secretary desk.  The prior owner of the desk restored it and painted the desk fire engine red and the top is black enamel.  The desk is esthetically beautiful.  It is red and black.  But its used in all the right ways. There are  scratch marks where my chair goes in and out of the area where your legs go in and the paint is chipped (patina). 

Products made in the past 40’s 50’s had a different level of quality.  A desk today would be made out of particle board or other materials that feel cheap.  This desk is made of steal and is going to outlive me with a little bit of care.

There is also a way over complicated drawer locking mechanism which just screems retro design.  The only lock on the desk is on the central pencil drawer.  However, when the pencil drawer is all the way in there is a lever system that moves a rod that locks the file cabinet drawer.  It’s totally mechanical and prone to not working right and the design is a total rube Goldberg and its beautiful that some engineer worked out the mechanics and then it went into production. 

Finally if you compare it to modern desks there is simply no way that you would get the level of quality and craftsmanship out of a modern desk without spending thousands and thousands of dollars.  .

Summary

a.       Esthetically beautiful

b.       Made to last (solid steal – make sure you have a crew to move it)

c.       Mechanically – fantastically retro

d.       Not one of kind – but you could not buy something of similar quality from a modern manufacturer without paying thousands and thousands of dollars.

2.       I and my family love our two whole house fans.  If you do not know what a whole house fan is – it is also known as an attic fan.  An attic fan is set up to blow air into the houses attic and pull air from inside the house.  So you leave windows open and the whole house fan will pull air from the house and pull in fresh outside air.  I live in Southern California where the days are hot and the nights are cool.  So once the heat of the day breaks you flip on the whole house fans (we have two because we have a split attic design to our house).  And it pulls the cool air in.  It also pressurizes the attic and forces the hot air that sits in the attic out.  We have air conditioning but hardly ever use it.  We put up with the heat during the day and at night the house is cool every quickly after the heat breaks.  Because it pulls in fresh air it’s also great for airing out smelly kids bedrooms.  Also if you every burned something in the kitchen and tried to fan the smoke out by swinging one of the doors – well a whole house fan solves that too.  Because its just a big fan they are super cheap to run and you don’t end up with dried out air like when you run your air-conditioned – it feels more natural. 

Summary

a.       Utilitarian

b.       Cheap to operate

3.       I love our vintage 1960’s / 1970’s crown speakers.  I could answer this question the same way I answered the vintage desk question.  They are esthetically beautiful (arguably – we will get to that in a minute), they are mechanically fantastically retro  - the magnets in the woofers each weigh something like 20lbs, and like the desk - while not one of kind you couldn’t buy a modern version without spending thousands of dollars. 

But that’s not why I love them.  They were my father-in-laws and after he  passed they sat in our garage for ½ dozen years.  They are kind of ugly – they are end table speakers with an octagonal wood frame and a marble top making them, like I said end table speakers.  So when we bought this house a few years back my wife decided that our living room was going to be bohemian retro.  She bought this throwback 1970’s velvety couch and paired it with a faded middle eastern rug – the whole look.  She said we needed end tables.  And I said what if I make your fathers speakers work again (I’m tearing up – right now).  So, I cleaned them up and I bought a modern retro tube amp and I ran speaker wire under the Persian rug and I bought a Google audio cast off of ebay (they discontinued it) and her dad’s speakers work again. 

Summary

a.       I love them because they make my wife happy

Summary of summary

I listed three products – this was unrehearsed  - I think together they represent a super cool aesthetic of product design. 

A desk that is built to last and aesthetically beautiful

A fan that is utilitarian

And a set of speakers that makes someone very happy

I don’t think I could have written a better story if I tried and I didn’t – this was off the cuff and unrehearsed. 

Now that I have answered the question – I open up and see part two. 
After you describe the three products, choose your favorite one.

The VP of that product askes you to design an APP for that product.

You set goal, metrics, and constraints.

I really hope I get to pick the fan for an App because building an app for a retro desk is going to suck…. and an app fo the speaker - I'm not sure how that differs from existing google home control apps that play music and control volume.  

An app for whole house fans. 

Describe the product

I have already provided a lot of detail about the whole house fans but let’s get into some detail. The whole whose fans are in the attic.  From inside the house you have a grate with louvers and a switch for the fan.  When I was a kid my dad had whole house fans and the switch was a turn dial timer – single speed.  My fans have a wireless remote that has three speeds and a timer button that cycles though 1-12 hours, always on and off.   

Goal:  I don’t think adding an app is going to help with acquisition (I don’t think the app is going to push the user over the edge to buy a whole house fan).  I don’t think an app for a whole house fan is going to help with engagement in a traditional sense we use it almost every night.  I do think that an app will help with customer satisfaction. 

Metric:  I’d like to set the metric at the end after we come up with some solutions. 

Constraints:  I’d like to limit this to a phone app – likely IOS and Android for max penetration and maybe tie into Google Home and Alexa for home automation.  I say maybe because I am not sure the market demand for whole house fans will warrant the additional support.  The same for localization I would want to see the sales figures by country. 

Users / Personas:

1.       Industrial users

2.       Home users

a.       Maximize energy usage

b.       Maximize comfort. 

I am sure there are industrial users – but the product is a whole house fan – its intended audience is homes – so ‘d like to use home users. 

When I think about home users energy and comfort are the two selling points of the fan.  The energy seems redundant because it is already pennies to operate and uses way less energy than the alternative which is air conditioning.  The sales materials don’t pit grin and bear the heat vs fan – it pits fan vs air conditioning.  So energy usage seems to be second to comfort. I’d like to use that. 

Pain points

1.       It gets too cold at night

2.       You don’t know when to turn it on/off (is the outside air cooler than the inside air)

3.       Sometimes they get turned on and there are not enough windows open

4.       When it was really hot a few weeks back we ran the air and the fans would get turned on too – sucking all the cool air out of the house and blowing it into the attic and outside

5.       The controls are battery operated remotes and my 5-year-old son sometimes hides them. 

Brainstorm solutions

I could compare the pain points but since this app seems kind of simple lets brainstorm the solutions and see if we can come up with an MVP.

Summary

After working the problem I may have been wrong about some of my assumptions – I’ll elaborate - if we are making a standalone app then maximizing comfort is the main goal.  If we tie into existing nest functionality then maximize comfort while controlling energy usage seems like a main goal.  As a stand alone we are pitting fan against grin and bear it.  But if it’s tied into nest thermostat functionality then we are back to the main argument for buying a whole hose fan that it was less money to operate than air conditioning.    

Standalone MVP

1.       Control on off and other functionality from the phone (timer, etc.)

Optional add on – temperature sensors that maintain the temperature and optimize comfort by turning it on and off.  I think these are optional features as it will drive up costs and is added functionality over current fans. 

Goals –

1.       customer engagement as measured by usage of the app to control the fan

2.       with optional thermometers   - customer satisfaction as measured by percent of time desired temperature was maintained by turning on and off the fan  

Nest integrated MVP with nest thermometer

1.       Control on off and other functionality from the phone (timer, etc.)

2.       Don’t run fan and air at the same time

3.       Leverage nest thermometer to maintain temperature – turn on and off

Optional add on – additional thermometers for sensing when to turn on and off the system

1.       When coupled with outside thermometer and attic thermometer nest can analyze the best way to maintain desired comfort level and maximize energy savings by suggesting switching between air and whole house fan. 

Goals

1.       Acquisition of nest users as measured by users of the nest whole house fan

2.       Acquisition / retention of nest users as measured by users’ period over period (shows increases and decreases)

3.       customer engagement as measured by usage of the app to control the fan

4.       customer satisfaction as measured by percent of time desired temperature was maintained by turning on and off the fan  

5.       customer satisfaction as measured by estimated energy savings by optimal use of air conditioning and fan.

Note the flow meter feature didn’t make it into any MVP solutions the sensor was new and the impact was low.

At the top of the problem I thought the app was going to be kind of lame.  But I think the integration as part of the nest ecosystem makes it much more interesting and perhaps encourages a whole new level of energy efficiency by showing users when to use the fan vs air conditioning. 

At my interview with Google, I made an in-depth explanation of 3 products, but for time reasons, I will only describe my favorite.

My three favorite product are:

1 - Personalized Radio flyer folding wagon

The way I am going to structure my answer is:

• The problem that the product solves
• How does the product accomplish these goals
• How does it compare with alternatives

Personally, it solves my logistic when I need to go:

• - Camping
• - Beach
• - Trail
• - Picnic
• - Groceries
• - Skying

In all those situations and having a big family, you need to carry lots of stuff. Kids never want to take their chairs, clothes, toys, Skyes, boots, etc.

This cart, with its personalized all-terrain wheels, can be used in sand, snow, rocks, or city, which is perfect for all situations.

I love this product because it folds and feet ideally in the trunk of my car, so we can transport it whatever we go.

Its canopy is excellent for kids to rest from being exposed to the sun and have a break.

I personalized it so we can have extra space to travel with our cooler in the back platform.

After investigating the market and other alternatives, I found this wagon was more expensive than other carts. Still, the possibility to personalize it (wheels, colors, style), add accessories, have replacements, a well-known brand, helped with my choice, and we love it!!!

2- Self-service car wash booth

I don't have space to store accessories and cleaning products or even the area to wash at home.

The automatic car wash machine never cleans as I expected, and with time car gets its paint deteriorated.

People that love car detailing want to use high-quality products and technology, and take care of their vehicle, the self-service washing kiosk is the best choice.

The problems that solve for me are:

• Having all the products, I could need to wash my car.
  Water, soap, wax, other specialized product, vacuum, cleaning the seats, drying, etc.
• Having the technology to accomplish the task
• No time constraints

3- Package concierge

Problems it solves:

• Anti-theft
• Notification when a package arrives
• Follow up in case you forget to pick up
• Different size capabilities
• Super fast and reliable
• 24/7
• Nice design

The VP of Radio Flyer personalized wagons askes you to design an APP for that product.
 

Me: Are we pursuing a specific goal?

I: You set it, we just want to develop an app

Me: May I design features in the app related to the hardware capabilities of the wagon?

I: that would be great

Me: I would like to set some constraints before sharing how I would structure this answer and define metrics and goals.

I: go-ahead

Me:

- constraint 1: Android app to start and test in the US (In the US we have beaches, mountains, parks, every climate to check the product)

- constraint 2: I assume we have no budget or time constraints and a team of specialized engineers.

I: Go ahead

Me: With this in mind, I would concentrate on defining the best personalized, scalable wagon with smartphone integration. We want to continue differentiating radio flyers focusing on customer satisfaction.

The reason why I am not thinking of monetizing at this time is that we should conduct a test before, and if results are ok, we could campaign an upgrade. 

Pursuing a unique experience with our wagons will bring more revenue for the company and acquisition threw virality and campaigns.

Sounds good?

I: Yes, go ahead.

Me: With this in mind, I would like to structure my answer. 

In the first place, I would like to define user personas and their pain problems.

After sharing those personas, I would like you to prioritize what personas pain point we are trying to solve.

Prioritizing one problem, I will brainstorm some solutions, prioritize on, define key metrics, and summarize my recommendation.

I go ahead.

Me: Give me just one minute to collect my thoughts.

45 seconds later...

Families (Open in, Trail families needs, campaign families needs, sky families need, groceries family need (Costco), picnic family needs)

Retailers (big retailers, Amazon, eBay, Costco, sky rentals, camping rentals, sports basement)

Do you want to focus on some specific?

I: I would like to focus on families that go to the snow, sky or fun

Me: Awesome, that one was my favorite.

Pain points:

• You need to move equipment from car to destination; this could be over snow, ice, climb, etc. But when you start having fun at one point, you may not finish at the same destination. (This is a problem because you need to return for your stuff)
• Need to make sure your things are where you left them