From May through August 2020, I interned remotely at Microsoft Garage in Vancouver, British Columbia. I took part in 3 different projects of varying lengths as the sole designer in a team of devs and PMs.
My main project was sponsored by Modern Workplace Transformations for whom I helped design and build new features to be integrated into the Lists app for Teams.
My main project was sponsored by Modern Workplace Transformations for whom I helped design and build new features to be integrated into the Lists app for Teams.
Working as the sole designer in the team, I was honored to add extensibility to a Microsoft Teams app which can contribute to a better experience for 75 million daily active users.
My work included leading brainstorming session, conducting user survey and testings, taking part on 30+ user interviews internally and with Microsoft customers, adopting an agile development cycle with my PM and developers, and handing off consistent, reusable design.
Things I worked on ―
My major project for MWT is under an NDA. If you would like to know more about the project, please reach out to me at:
hello@tanvichhabra.com
Hackathon 2020 ―
Participated in the yearly internal hackathon event with more than 20,000 hackers. I worked with a group of developers and project managers across the globe working possible solutions dealing with transliteration between different scripts of the same spoken language
PowerToys ―
Worked with a team of 3 devs to create a color picker application for Windows that could ship with PowerToys, a system utilities designed for power users developed by Microsoft for use on the Windows operating system.
The application was designed based on research done through surveys and competitive analysis.
A tweet from our sponsor during our presentation and peoples retweeted reaction can be seen/read here
The application was designed based on research done through surveys and competitive analysis.
A tweet from our sponsor during our presentation and peoples retweeted reaction can be seen/read here
Photos App ―
Worked with a team of 6 devs and a PM to fix and ship different accessibility related issues in the Photos app.
As an additional handoff within this project, I collaborated with my PM intern on a proposal document exploring various accessibility related features possible within Windows Photos App based on research, brainstorming sessions, and discussions with managers and designers on the OS team.
As an additional handoff within this project, I collaborated with my PM intern on a proposal document exploring various accessibility related features possible within Windows Photos App based on research, brainstorming sessions, and discussions with managers and designers on the OS team.
Takeaways ―
Better Collaboration ―
It was an interesting challenge to work as the sole designer remotely. I realised the potential of digital collaboration using the programs we use on a day to day basis. As well as the importance of being considerate of issues that crop up for people and being inclusive to make sure everyone got heard
Learning New Things ―
Other than experiencing the full product cycle and working closely with PM, developers and stakeholders, I got to hone my design skills as well as adopt new power-ups in my toolbox.
