Usage reporting in Autodesk Account
Provide software administrators with end user product usage metrics
Overview
Imagine blindly having to make an administrative decision that has monetary and efficiency implications for an entire company? That is what administrators of Autodesk software had to endure as they had to manage their purchased software subscriptions without the necessary data to help them do their job confidently.
Problem
Administrators that purchase Autodesk software have to assign seats and distribute to end users in the company. After assigning those seats, they have no way of knowing how those products are being used. This makes it difficult for them to make decisions regarding purchasing more subscriptions, removing user access, or how usage is trending over time.
Goal
Provide software administrators with end user product usage metrics and visualizations to help them make data-driven decisions in a single place that is easy to read and understand.
Role
I was the design lead of this project, partnering closely with my product management and engineering counterparts to represent the user experience.
I coordinated the overall information hierarchy, user task flows, interactions, wireframe creation, and overseeing the development from a design perspective. I partnered with our dedicated design research team to conduct interviews, facilitate feedback workshops, and integrate findings into the final shipped product.
Process
As the design lead in this project, I worked closely with my lead product manager and engineering manager to define our product roadmap and prioritize feature sets to work on, all tied to high-level strategic goals. When I joined this project, I inherited the work of a prior designer and the ongoing customer research conducted by our product manager. They met with customers and defined which reporting metrics would be useful for their business. Upon starting the project, this was the following process we started and continued to iterate as we built additional features.
My product manager and I would do white boarding sessions to map out the intended experience we wanted to build. We listed customer needs, pain points, and loosely scribbled an experience that could satisfy customer needs and business requirements. This allowed for clear alignment between product and design.
I would then develop wireframes to test concepts and build clickable prototypes to share with our product manager and engineering leads. We would collectively review the experience and make iterations based on feedback discussed. If trade-offs needed to be made, those would be discussed at this stage..
As this project relied heavily on data, we wanted to design it extensibly so that we were developing a modular framework. This way, we could reuse data visualizations, metrics, and UI components across our feature and even eventually across Autodesk Account.
Once alignment on the user flows and design occurred, I would pass wireframes to a visual designer and collaborate with them to finalize design details and ensure it meets brand standards. Visual design and myself in UX would work hand-in-hand to fine tune in this detailed design stage.
Once visual design specs were completed, we would have a walkthrough with the engineering team and allow them to ask questions and clarify details so they know everything that needs to be developed. After that, design would frequently review the development work with a constant dialogue with engineers.
Jeff Kinder, Autodesk’s Chief Digital Officer, showcasing usage reporting at the One Team conference keynote in 2019.
Outcome
We were able to successfully release product usage reporting in Autodesk Account to over 500,000 administrators in 2019. We built a modular page template and utilized the HighCharts data visualization library to give us customizable chart components. By being able to reuse UI elements and apply them in a modular approach, we increased our development velocity and was able to slowly develop a reporting platform for Autodesk Account.
“Seat Usage”, the official name of product usage reporting, was well-received post release. Yet, now that the door was open, customers wanted more data now that Autodesk was providing the transparency and information they yearned for.
One frequent request was an individual user report (how specific users were using the product), which we delivered in our next release as part of the Premium subscription plan. View my other case study, “Introducing Premium Subscription”, for more details.
One lesson learned was that each administrator’s data needs are unique and they provide different levels of data granularity. We need to tailor our reporting to be as general, yet granular to accommodate the use cases most users. Overall, it was a successful project that continues to expand as a platform.