4400_F14_LIU_REPORT

Eric (Meng Chen) Liu / IDES 4400 Internship Report / 2014
This report discusses my experience working with MicroMetrics, a tech start-up
company who utilizes user-centered UI/UX design for an SaaS (software as a service)
solution to collect data from brick and mortar businesses customers. The report
includes observations on the role of user-centred design in the product development
process, as well as characteristics unique to a start-up business and digital product
development, such as having a close-up look at all the other departments in the small
team and Scrum and Agile methodology’s effect on the designer.

Table of Contents
1. Company
1.1 About MicroMetrics............................................................................................................................
1.2 Industry Sector......................................................................................................................................
1.3 Size and Makeup.................................................................................................................................
1.4 Relevant Departments......................................................................................................................
2. Internship Responsibility and Roles
2.1 Work Performed...................................................................................................................................
2.2 Chain of Command............................................................................................................................
2.3 Skills and Knowledge Required...................................................................................................
2.4 Product Outcomes..............................................................................................................................
MicroMetrics Web-App and Mobile-App.............................................................................
Call-to-action Graphics for iPadKiosks..................................................................................
Business Brochures and Sales Pitch Presentation Deck.............................................
3. Relationship between Education and Professional Practice
3.1 Analysis of Difference........................................................................................................................
3.2 Feedback Opportunities..................................................................................................................
3.3 Advantages............................................................................................................................................
4. Other
4.1 Start-up Environment........................................................................................................................
4.2 Digital Product Development........................................................................................................
5. Discussion
5.1 How to Prepare.....................................................................................................................................
5.2 What to Expect......................................................................................................................................
5.3 How to Optimize the Experience.................................................................................................
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List of Figures
Figure 1.1 The MicroMetrics team photo in Invest Ottawa’s Grindspace
Figure 2.1 The MicroMetrics web-app and mobile-app
Figure 2.2 A sample screen from MicroMetrics mobile-app survey
Figure 2.3 Two different sizes of the sample call-to-action graphics, which can be customized
according to the needs of the clients
Figure 2.4 Back-end developer Anton doing a survey on the iPadKiosk with the call-to-action
graphics
Figure 2.5 Sample slides from business brochures and the sales pitch deck
Figure 3.1 Co-CEO Martin Kratky-Katz holding a MicroMetrics team meeting
Figure 4.1 The MicroMetrics team doing networking in the Invest Ottawa incubator

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1. Company
1.1 About MicroMetrics
MicroMetrics, legal name Micro Metrics Inc., was
founded in March 2013 by Martin Kratky-Katz and
Artem Abramov, and has continued to grow since
then. Martin, a distinguished business academic
and entrepreneur who has won lots of pitch
competitions, had co-founded another start-up
before (an online social platform for politics &
constituency management system for politicians),
while Artem has extensive experience working
with Chinese businesses and investors. Both of its
co-founders had worked in sales for cloud-based
software services, and therefore, have insights in
the business intelligence industry sector.
The business idea happened one day when they
were standing in a coffee shop with laminated QR
codes around the store, and they realized how
inefficient the current survey solutions are. Later,
they put this idea of starting their own business into
action, to address a common real-world problem
many brick and mortar retail businesses face. They
started the business as one of Invest Ottawa’s
portfolio companies, and they are still one of the
fastest growing companies in the program.
MicroMetrics’s central mission is to help offline
businesses get better business insights by
collecting more data from customers on the spot.
With more efficient ways to gain customer insights,
it allows businesses to achieve organizational
goals, improve marketing and drive more sales. The
company now partners with Ottawa Health Group,
PopEyes, Direct Buy, and more brick and mortar
businesses that are looking for more innovative
service solutions.
1.2 Industry Sector
MicroMetrics belongs to the business intelligence
service industry sector, offering a software as a
service (SaaS) solution through a web application
and a mobile application. Its competitors
range from traditional survey tools like receipt-
based surveys and QR code surveys, to more
contemporary web-based and mobile-based tools
like FluidSurvey, Survey Monkey, ResponseTek,
Typeform, and Benbria. The main challenge in the
industry is that collecting data from customers is
extremely hard, and the response rates are very
low. The traditional receipt-based, web-based, or
even the more recent mobile-based surveys, all
have very low response rates, ranging from 2-4%.
But MicroMetrics’s solution is able to achieve 5
times the average of data collection rate (around
20% response rate from MicroMetrics first product).
Given that tech start-ups are very competitive, and
a lot of them don’t make it past their first winter,
but MicroMetrics’s product solution is innovative
enough at solving the real world problem and
enticing enough for customers that they are
growing in their industry and continuing to have
more clients on board with this novel service.

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1.3 Size and Makeup
Being a fast-growing start-up, MicroMetrics
has gone through quite a bit of expansion and
personnel changes. By the time I left the company,
it has 13 full-time paid employees, plus the advisers
and part-time employees. Artem and Martin are
the Co-CEOs and they take care of the sales,
marketing, public relations and finances, while
Tomasz Ogrodzinski, the CXO, and Andre Richards,
the CTO, are in charge of the product development.
The Co-CEOs led the sales team and the marketing
team, the CXO lead the design team, and the CTO
lead the development team. Part-time employees,
The company also has a few industry advisors,
like Jay Proulx from Adobe, and Ron Gagnier who
worked in IBM. Because the company is very small
and connected, everyone knows each others on a
first-name basis, and there is certainly no feeling of
isolation from the other teams.
1.4 Relevant Departments
The design team was led by Tomasz Ogrozinski
and consisted of 2 other full-time designers
and myself. The development team works very
closely with the design team to implement the
designs, and the design team needs to consult the
development team about any possible features.
The development team was led by Andre Richards,
and consisted of 4 full-time developers (front-end,
back-end and mobile), and 3 part-time developers.
I had worked with all of them to consult the
feasibility of the digital product features. The design
department also deals with the sales and marketing
team to make marketing materials they need to
present to the investors or potential clients, such
as business brochures, pitch deck, and website
graphics. The sales team also acted as a good
second-hand resource about our potential clients
and their needs, since what they deal with all the
business clients first-hand and have a good idea of
what the clients are looking for.
Figure 1.1 The MicroMetrics team photo in Invest Ottawa’s Grindspace

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design the next set of features, at the same time
when they produce graphics needed for the
current feature implementation.
2.3 Skills and Knowledge Required
Working as a Graphic Designer, it is essential
to have a strong portfolio with focus on visual
design and typography to demonstrate your visual
communication skills. Medium to high level of skills
in Adobe softwares like Photoshop and Illustrator,
as well as Microsoft Words and PowerPoint, are
imperative for the designer to integrate into a
digital workflow. More, working knowledge of user
experience and user-centered design principles
come in handy when generating insights and
evaluating the features of the digital products. It
is also important to have experience or at least a
strong interest in software and web related design.
Knowledge of front-end web development code
languages like HTML/CSS/JQuery can also be
an asset, given the UI/UX concepts need to be
implementable with the capability of the codes. At
last but not least, because of the interconnected
structure of a start-up team, the designer needs
to be flexible, creative and adaptable to different
situations, and be able to communicate with the
team effectively and manage the tasks efficiently.
2.4 Product Outcomes
During the 6-month internship, I have worked on
3 extensive digital projects in total, plus inputs in
marketing materials and web graphics. This section
includes a selected few of the projects I worked
on during my internship, and in the interest of
protecting the confidentiality of the company, it
does not include the company projects that are not
to be disclosed to the public.
2.1 Work Performed
My official role at the company was a Graphic
Designer, and the works I performed during
the internship ranged from rough concepts
to highly detailed visuals. I engaged with the
team in the ideation process for new features,
products, and solutions, and then worked with
product development team and user experience
professionals to develop wireframes. I created UI
designs from quick, low fidelity wireframes using
sketches and Adobe Illustrator, to pixel-perfect,
high fidelity look-and-feel mock-ups for websites,
web-based softwares and mobile apps. From
there, I created graphic artifacts for front-end and
mobile developers to implement. More, I produced
compelling marketing materials, and designed
beautiful graphics for use on the company’s blog
and affiliate sites.
2.2 Chain of Command
I worked under the direct supervision of the CXO
Tomasz, and most of the tasks and assignments
came from him. The CTO Andre, who put on
developmental constraints and technological
requirements, and co-CEO Artem, who set business
objectives and time constraints, worked and
negotiated with Tomasz to set priorities for the
projects, and then Tomasz would assign tasks
based on the result of discussions. Also, the
design and development team employed Scrum
and Agile methodology to develop the digital
products. What that means is that every coder,
developer and designer has a say to which task
they feel best qualified to do. During the weekly
meetings facilitated by Andre, who is also the
Scrum master, everyone on the teams including
the team leaders would create tasks based on the
current development status, and then each choose
the relevant tasks according to our abilities. The
team leaders would work with team members in
this rather democratized and time-focused process
to assign everyone the appropriate tasks. The
designers in this process, however, sometimes
need to think ahead of the weekly meetings to
2. Internship Responsibilities and Role

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MicroMetrics web-app and mobile-app
MicroMetrics web-app and mobile-app are the
company’s first and main product offering. It
provides the tools brick and mortar businesses
need for their customers to fill out a quick survey
on the spot on a mobile device like an iPad. The
surveys are designed to be quick (less than 8
questions), incentivized (the survey taker would
get a reward, eg. a coupon, when they fill out their
email at the end of the survey) and on-the-spot. The
apps are able to get response rates ranging from
10-20%, around 5 times the industry average.
The business owner can go on the MicroMetrics
web-app to manage, control, deploy, and
customize surveys and rewards from top to bottom.
The mobile-app on the in-store iPads are synced
in real time with the web-app as the customers fill
out the surveys. The business owners can then run
different surveys at different times, and access and
view the results in real-time.
Although the main concept of this product was
formed before the start of my internship, it went
through quite a few iterations that incorporated
new features and look-and-feel based on the
user-testing results and new business objectives.
We built look-and-feel mock-ups in Illustrator and
photoshop, and tested the coded prototypes in
pilot stores, trade-shows and open-houses. The
design process of this product is a typical design
thinking framework of convergent and divergent
ideation, test and re-iteration. This product is also
designed using Bootstrap (a mobile first web
design framework), and Agile methodology to
implement the intended design feature by feature.
There were quite a few unique problems we faced
when designing this product, and using a design
thinking framework and Agile methodology,
we achieved the objectives of the project with
efficiency and efficacy.
Figure 2.1 The MicroMetrics web-app and mobile-app
Figure 2.2 A sample screen from MicroMetrics
mobile-app survey

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Call-to-Action Graphics for iPadKiosks
This accessory is offered as part of the MicroMetrics
service to get customers’ attention in the brick
and mortar stores. As a solution to the low product
presence problem of the in-store iPads and iPad
stands, the team decided to provide clients the
service of designing the call-to-action graphics for
them. Using the guidelines provided by iPadKiosks
(whose iPad stands the company use for installing
the iPads in store), the design team made design
templates for businesses in different sectors, and
also customized designs for specific events.
Figure 2.4 Back-end developer Anton doing a
survey on the iPadKiosk with the call-to-action
graphics
Figure 2.3 Two
different sizes of the
sample call-to-action
graphics, which can be
customized according
to the needs of the
clients

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Business Brochures and Sales Pitch Presentation
Deck
Aside from the digital product offerings of
the company, I also contributed to some
accompanying graphics for the sales and pitches.
For example, the design team made sales
brochures targeting different industry sectors,
and the pitch deck for important investors. The
graphics were made in Illustrator and Photoshop,
then assembled to a PDF in InDesign or PowerPoint
format at easily transferable sizes. The documents
aim to add visual stimuli to aid the communications
of the sales and pitch presentations.
Figure 2.5 Sample
slides from business
brochures and the
sales pitch deck

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3.1 Analysis of Differences
First and foremost, in professional practice, the
technological and business constraints become
glaringly real and immediate. In school projects,
although there are a lot of efforts to emulate the
realism of the constraints, they were no way as
gripping as the constraints in the professional
world. The unpredictability and unexpectedness
of a lot of the tasks I got assigned during my
internship, and the crunched up timeline for
development, were all results of trying to meet a
particular business requirement. At school, there
is also a lot more autonomy in the direction of your
own school projects, but in actual design practices,
you have to make a lot of compromises based on
what is reasonable with the resources at hand and
the time-frame you have.
Secondly, the professional world is a very team-
oriented environment, and there are a few
implications. In a business-driven and professional
setting like this, management on the team
and individual levels takes on a new level of
importance. Working with multiple designers on
the same project means that the organization of
individual works and files matters a great deal to the
general productivity of the whole team. More, the
frequency and clarity of communications needed
for your opinions to be heard and for the project to
work become a lot more important than when you
are at school. Unlike working with the professors
and school project teams, which happen perhaps
once a week, your work is always under review,
and you are constantly changing your designs
based on the feedbacks. Communications
between team members becomes lot more central
to the development of the project. The reassuring
thing about working in a professional team though,
is that there are a lot more experts within reach
who can quickly answer your questions about the
feasibility of your design.
The professional practice can also be a lot more
intense and fast-paced than school. You could
3. Relationship Between Education and
Professional Practice
see how stressed out people are about meeting
the business objectives, because it may mean a
dead-or-alive situation for them. Working under
pressure takes on a new meaning in professional
practice. Unlike in school where design research is
immensely valued, people who work at non-design
departments may not see its value that much,
and there also was not a lot of space for design
research in a crunched-up product development
timeline. The CXO and design team in MicroMetrics
had to really convince other members on the team
the value of design thinking, and push for rooms to
do design researches and testings.
3.2 Feedback Opportunities
I think it would have been helpful to my work
during the internship if I had taken Aspect of
Product Design Methodology (PSYC 4800), which
teaches a lot about human-computer interactions
and even some basics about codes. I had to do
a lot of learning on my own to catch up with the
demand of the job, even with mentoring from the
CXO.
There could perhaps be a third year UI/UX design
elective that are in the same category as packaging
design and exhibition design. The course may
offer insights to digital product development and
involve students making interactive prototypes
using tools like InDesign and After Effect. In this
way, the students who are interested in having
another option of being a UI/UX designer (which
is increasingly in demand nowadays) will have
some industry-specific skills on their resumes and
relevant works in their portfolios.
Also, it would be great to have more lectures or
workshops that helps the students build their
typography and graphic layout skills, as well as
how to use InDesign. These skills would really
come in handy in designing any print or information
based materials.

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3.3 Advantages
Although the title stated Graphic Designer, the
company believed an Industrial Designer may
be a better fit because they design with users in
mind. Indeed, thanks to 3rd Year Major Studio
and Design and the User, I had approached the
internship design challenges with actual end-users
in the focus. It also helped me better understand
the product design process and design thinking
(convergent and divergent ideation).
There are also other courses in the school that
prepared me for this internship in different ways.
Packaging Design gave me a better understanding
of graphic design principles and strengthened
my graphic design skills, ranging from the use of
hierarchy in typography to understanding when
to use what type of PDF format. Professional
Practice made me understand the importance of
collaboration in the professional world and the
importance of intellectual property, and also how to
market myself as a designer.
Finally, my psychology minor definitely helped me
a lot with this internship. Having taken Research
Method and Introduction to Statistics, I could have
a better idea of how collecting and analyzing data
work, and also I could evaluate which features
and metrics are important to the web-app. I also
think it made me stand out in the interview process
because the company knows that knowledge
about research and statistics is desirable in the
context of this job.
Figure 3.1 Co-CEO Martin Kratky-Katz holding a MicroMetrics team meeting

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4. Other
4.1 Start-up Environment
There are a few distinct characteristics of working in
a start-up environment like MicroMetrics. Working
closely with other departments in small teams, I
got a very close and first-hand look at the business
side of things. I heard a lot of conversations about
the constantly new business goals we needed to
meet. There were a lot of talks between the co-
CEOs and team leaders about getting investors,
fundings, good clients, and how important building
the product innovatively is essential to getting all
the important financial resources. While working
there, I realized that a big corporation is essentially
a scaled-up and expanded version of this small
company.
The company is full of excellent salesmen. Even
Tomasz, the CXO, had worked in sales. All of them
can give a persuasive elevator pitch on a whim with
their excellent story-telling skills. In my opinion, this
characteristic really helps achieve the success of
the company. They are also very resourceful and
hard-working. They networked like crazy, worked
70+ hours, and in turn found a lot of advisors
and people who are on board with their projects.
Even myself, established a few connections with
entrepreneurs and professionals in other start-ups
while working in an incubator environment.
4.2 Digital Product Development
Although there are a lot of similarities between
physical product development and digital
product development, there are still a few distinct
characteristics digital product development
possesses. One of the biggest differences between
physical and digital products is how fast the
prototyping and testing could go. It may take
weeks to months for a physical product part to be
made, shipped and tested, but with codes, it may
only take a few hours or days to have a feature built
up and running. The feedback loop is very fast and
rewarding, because the product is built feature by
feature according to your design, and is constantly
updating and re-iterating.
Also, Scrum and Agile methodology worked in a
way that let everyone utilize the best of their skills
and offered transparency in the workflow of the
team. This process really promoted connectedness
and cross-pollination. I was always aware of what
everyone else was working on, and in turn I could
see all the nuts and bolts in the development of
the product. Working cross-disciplinary like this
definitely strengthened my knowledge about the
making of a digital product.
Figure 4.1 The MicroMetrics team networking in the Invest Ottawa incubator

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5. Discussion
5.1 How to Prepare
In terms of using what was taught in school in
preparation for this internship, I definitely reviewed
the user-centred design literature I have collected
during school, also materials about design thinking
and user testing. But given that this internship
did not fall into the traditional industrial design
field, there were some industry-specific skills and
knowledge I had to acquire by myself. These
include an understanding of human-computer
interaction design, basic knowledge about codes,
and more advanced graphic design skills.
In terms of other resources, there were a lot
of books and websites I used to gain better
understanding of the specific knowledge. I read
The Elements of User Experience by Jesse James
Garret, Don’t Make Me Think by Steve Krug to
understand the principles of UI/UX design and how
to minimize cognitive workload. I read Designing
Web Application by Nathan Berry, and A Practical
Guide to Designing for Web by Mark Boulton
to understand the unique characteristics and
common problems in designing for digital. I also
checked out the works of prominent figures like
Edward Tufte, and collected a lot of infographics
to better familiarize myself with data visualization.
More, The Interaction Design Foundation (http://
www.interaction-design.org/) has a lot of free and
useful interaction design books on the website,
which Tomasz would assign readings from for me
to discuss with him.
A very basic understanding about codes also goes
a long way. I found out what each code does and
how front-end and back-end programming differ
on the job, but there are a lot of free resources
online you could use to know their capabilities
and limits, namely CodeAcademy (http://www.
codecademy.com/learn) and W3Schools (http://
www.w3schools.com/).
Furthermore, I was lucky enough that I took a
bunch of Adobe software classes before I got into
university, so that I had a very good foundation
with these professional standard programs.
Those computer skills hugely benefited me in
my internship. My advice would be to do a lot of
Illustrator and Photoshop tutorials for sure and get
good with them. Also, get as much graphic design
practices as you can; the practical experiences will
greatly improve the efficiency and quality of your
work. More, a few books on graphic design with
example works can really help you communicate
your ideas with people.
Finally, stay tuned into and get inspired on Dribble,
Tumblr and Pinterest. These social network sites
for creatives can stimulate your creativity and also
keep you updated on the trend in UI/UX design.
Digital design is changing all the time, and this is
one of the best ways to stay on top of the trends.
5.2 What to Expect
Like most start-ups, MicroMetrics was basically a
no-collar work environment with flexible schedules
and workplace. Although we had our own cubicles,
we could easily go into other open workspaces to
do our work. Also, there were times when everyone
was working overtime to meet a deadline. As an
enthusiastic intern, I put in a few extra hours to meet
a deadline (like the pitch deck presentation), but
you are not obliged to do it unless you really want
to show them your enthusiasm.
There would be a lot of communication happening,
so be prepared to explain yourself on a daily basis
and make other people understand what it is you
are trying to get them to do. You would also need
to foster trust from the very first day. Honesty is the
best policy, and an open attitude and approach to
deal with interpersonal relationships in workplace
is essential to the functioning of the team. Also,
despite it being a casual workplace, you should still
aim for a detail-oriented, self-organized and self-
motivated professionalism.
More on the psychological side, during my
internship, I felt frustrated sometimes, and felt like
I was clueless and inadequate for this position.
Not saying the company did not value my input,
but I was just neglecting the fact that I possess a

11
lot valuable skills and a lot of the works I did were
new to me. Looking back now, I should have given
myself a thumbs-up for making much progress in
a short time like that. It is really important to find a
balance between being demanding to your work
performance and being kind to yourself.
5.3 How to Optimize the Experience
If there was one thing every intern should do before
he/she gets into it, I would say it is setting goals for
oneself, and not losing sight of them. It is very easy
to feel lost with all the work constantly being fed to
you and lose your motivations, if you do not know
what you want to get out of the internship. Having
goals also tracks your progress and growth in the
internship and make sure you are getting what you
need from the experience.
Aside from the intra-personal growth, it would also
be great if you can go to conventions or events
with your co-workers and form some interpersonal
connections. 4 people on our team went to
UX Camp last year, and it was not only a great
networking opportunity but also an inspirational
experience that aided our work. When you are in
those professional events and environments, talk
to anyone and everyone and be friendly, whether
they are on your team or not. You never know what
unexpected and amazing thing cross-pollination
could give you. For me personally, talking to our
back-end developers was really eye-opening and
interesting to me. It made me look at digital systems
in a way I never thought of before.
Finally, be proactive, not reactive. Find work for
yourself, and take initiatives. In a start-up company,
everything is moving so fast and the team leaders
are working 70+ hours at their threshold capacity.
Sometimes they become very occupied and have
very limited attention and time to manage you.
So when no one is assigning work to you at the
moment, find something to do yourself, and always
think ahead. You might just hit on something they
all missed.

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