Lyft Autonomous

This summer, I interned on Lyft Autonomous’ in-ride XP team, primarily working on AV App - the in-vehicle display and audio system. 

This work is under NDA. Please reach out for details.

  • The end of a ride is a critical part of a golden-path Lyft Ride. During this internship, my job was to ensure Lyft riders could navigate the end of their rides - safely and intuitively - when no human drivers are present. This project is part of Lyft Autonomous’ mission to turn self-driving technology to transportation.

  • One of the most fun and challenging parts of my project is the lack of set paradigms. The fun is in being able to start with a blank sheet of paper where everything is up for debate. The challenge is that there’s no easy route of applying tested ‘solutions.’ I need to think through all the details, hypotheses, and ensure they make sense by using design fundamentals, leveraging cross-functional feedback, presenting constantly, and of course, sitting in a self-driving car myself (which is fun too?)

What am I solving?
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How might we build a robot-assisted ride hailing experience that riders love and trust to safely end their ride journey?

My impacts?
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🚀 Shipped full end-to-end flow within a short period. Worked closely with Eng team on design hand-off and built animated and interactive prototypes to ensure high quality implementation.

Why does this matter?
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Solving this problem allows us to make riders feel safe and guided at the end of their AV journey, in a truly driverless way.

👯‍♀️ Collaborated cross-functionally - product, research, engineering, and content, across all stages. Led brainstorming sessions to align on visions and define product framework.

🔈 Presented solutions to leadership (Head of Fleet, Lyft Design Leadership Team) and cross-functional teams regularly. Prioritize feedback and rapid iterated designs based on product roadmap.

💖 Contributed to design culture by helping with internal events and all-hands meetings; worked directly with Head of Design to prep for annual Board Meeting; leading workshops at Lyft PD+.

Yes, it’s challenging, but I learned A TON.

Prioritize, but with a big picture in mind

Being a designer on Lyft Autonomous means I have to ground my designs in today's capabilities while keeping the future in mind. My design cannot just meet today’s needs but should also be scalable to address future states and edge cases. Specifically, I need to be thoughtful with the components I built, write design principles and frameworks with my team to ensure we are always following the product vision and goals.

Design for life, not just screens

What’s unique about designing at Lyft is that you do not just build digital experience but also shaping how people take transportation in real life. The stake is high - you cannot play with people’s safety. During my internship, I strived to build an experience that riders really need - this means I need to have a strong empathy to make solid hypotheses, and learning a ton of new skills - such as sound/voice design and animation.

Befriend with ambiguity

Ambiguity could be intimidating, but it opens up unique opportunities to grow and build relationships. Thanks to the ambiguity of my project, I needed to take a proactive role in communicating early and often, escalating to leadership when things get tricky. I learned how to set realistic expectations to push my project forward, and more importantly, built trust within my cross-functional teams.

One of the most fun and challenging parts of designing for autonomous experience is the lack of set paradigms.

I need to think through all the details, hypotheses, and ensure they make sense by using design fundamentals, leveraging cross-functional feedback, presenting constantly, and of course, sitting in a self-driving car myself (which is fun too?)

Last thoughts on designing at Lyft 💖
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It has been a blast - and much of a privilege - to be able to work with some of the best designers in the industry. When people asked what surprised me the most during this internship, my answer has always been “the people are too good to be true!” Everyone - from my fellow design interns to design leadership - has been unbelievably supportive, resourceful, and trusted me to think through big & real challenges. Special shout-out to Kyo Kim, Gwen Zhang, and Micah Shotel for holding my hands through this fun and ambiguous project. You are the reasons why I keep falling in love with design, over and over again.

ALL WORK UNDER NDA 🙊

ALL WORK UNDER NDA 🙊

If you are interested in learning more about this project and my experience at Lyft, please feel free to contact me at yixil@uw.edu.