Fluke UXR Internship

UX Research Internship

TL;DR

Skills: Usability Testing, Qualitative Analysis, Data Cleaning, Data Visualization, Literature Review, Interviewing, Stakeholder Management, Card Sorting Analysis, Reporting, Hardware

Highlights and Impact:

Turned UX skeptics into advocates by delivering actionable insights and collaborating across departments.
Identified key research gaps and led usability testing (2 rounds), concept testing (2 rounds), SME interviews, and heuristic evaluations for both software and hardware.
Improved research quality across teams by advising on methods and developing a "UX Research Tips" resource.
Tested and developed strategies to utilize an internal AI tool for synthesizing VOC insights and guiding data-driven decisions.

Top Lessons Learned:

Onboarding quickly to complex, highly technical products—each with its own users, environments, and requirements—was a fun challenge. It pushed me to collaborate closely across departments throughout the entire research process.
Navigating a culture where “everyone does their own research” and UX research wasn’t yet widely embraced was a challenge. As the second UX researcher, I had to spend time advocating for the value of rigorous, user-centered research.

So what did I do?

There was no clearly defined internship project from the start beyond being asked to work with the ii900, an acoustic imaging device that can detect and visualize sounds that are inaudible to human ears.

ii900 Usability Testing (Hardware): Conducted foundational research, heuristic evaluation and in-person usability testing, on acoustic imaging device. Findings revealed core usability issues that led to design recommendations.
Baseline Usability Testing (Software): Conducted foundational usability testing to understand and improve the overall performance and user-experience of the thermal image (TI) editing software.
Baseline SME Interviews and Concept Testing (Software): Designers had two competing visions for a new feature on TI software. I conducted SME interviews and concept testing to help the designers understand how the feature should work. One concept was a clear winner, and moved forward with further iteration.
ii900 Concept Testing (Hardware): Mentored the Industrial Design intern through her first research study - co-developing a concept testing plan and helping her run moderated sessions.
Bonus Projects: Acted as a research resource across teams, providing feedback on study designs and analysis. Created strategies for using internal AI tools to extract insights from VOC data.

What is the ii900?

The ii900 line is an acoustic imaging device that can detect and visualize sounds that are inaudible to human ears. It is handheld, primarily used in factory settings to detect compressed air and gas leaks (sometimes for hours at a time), and costs up to $25,000.

SME Interviews

Interviewed engineers, including the inventors, to understand use cases, physical demands, usage environments, future development, and more.

Literature Review

Dug into 5+ years of VOC materials (via EnjoyHQ), including customer calls, on-site visits, and prototype demos, to ground the research in past feedback.

Heuristic Evaluation

Once I understood the device and use cases, I personally used the device in different environments to document usability issues.

Aligning on a direction

Although I had establisehd a foundational understanding of the device, it's users, and the problems I could explore, I quickly realized that stakeholders had very different ideas of what the product needed and what my role should be.
‍
One SME, who had been involved since the device’s inception, was confident in the current understanding of user pain points. He felt we didn’t need more research and told me directly, He believed that the main problems were likely the size and weight, and that I should focus on more advanced features. In his words: “We already know what’s wrong with it.”

However, the PM believed that anyone should be able to use this device, without training. He was concerned that upcoming features would only increase complexity, and emphasized the need for simplified interactions.

The UX manager felt that it had been so long since usability testing had been conducted, that a new round of usability testing should be conducted before any further releases. When I looked into it, I found that what had been labeled as “usability testing” was actually early-stage concept feedback—not evaluations of real-world use.

Getting back to the basics

These conflicting perspectives put me in a tricky spot—should I trust the SME’s deep expertise or the PM and UX Manager’s concern that usability was lacking for newer users? I navigated this by:

‍Acknowledging each perspective: I listened closely, reflected their concerns back, and positioned myself as filling in gaps and being a resource to assist, not as challenging their expertise.
‍Clarifying goals with evidence: I surfaced VOC data and documentation gaps to show key usability questions were still unanswered, especially with major UI updates ahead.
Reframing the value of research: I reassured the SME that research could validate the user concerns he’d already surfaced—giving them more weight in product decisions. I also emphasized that we’d collaborate on the testing plan to ensure his additional concerns were represented.

In the end, I proposed quick, foundational usability testing as a low-risk way to gather fresh insights. This approach helped build alignment and buy-in across the team, especially important before layering on new and advanced features.

Setting up the sessions

How do we simulate a real leak in a controlled environment? As it turns out - antique dental equipment is perfect!

The device had several leaks, including two easy to find and one more hidden.
It runs at a consistent rate, allowing for participants to explore and take their time with the task.
It's portable, to allow for easy setup and tear-down of sessions.

The main downside is that it is quite loud. While this may help simulate a real user environment (typically a factory), it was not ideal for recording audio.

Room Setup

Creating the room setup required some trial and error, and testing with colleagues.

I used conference room connected devices to record the main audio and video, with a second camera positioned over the participant’s shoulder to capture their on-device interactions.
Participants started standing to find leaks, then moved to sitting for the second half of the session to explore additional features and menus.
I positioned myself to observe the participants in both standing and sitting positions. The antique leak device was placed on a cart in front of me, so that I could see what users were viewing.

Bonus round - guerilla research!

There were a few tasks that I felt should be included in usability testing, but due to time constraints I removed them. However, I realized that one of the tasks I removed did not require a true user to determine the usability of the task.

One of the features that I found myself to be completely unusable was the drawing notes. The user must write one letter at a time, which is unintuitive.

I asked 10 random Fluke employees to use the handwriting feature on the ii900 notes. No participants successfully use this feature, with 6/10 writing on the large white space (which is where the inputted text shows up) instead of the the grey space below. I provided the team with detailed findings on how to improve this feature such as supporting whole word input, increasing text size, and making the text input area more obvious.

Findings and Recommendations

While participants generally found the core task—identifying leaks—straightforward, the overall experience revealed several critical usability issues, especially around interaction patterns and long-term use.

The device is big and heavy. Frustration with difficult tasks was exacerbated by the size and weight of the device. Given that users might hold this device for minutes or hours, ergonomics directly affected perceived usability.
Inconsistent interactions throughout the device. Basic actions like exiting, saving, or navigating screens varied throughout the interface. For example, the “X” button closed a screen in some areas, but saved changes in others. These inconsistencies slowed participants down and made them unsure of what would happen next.
User mental models. Participants expected interactions and features (such as how image galleries, or typing) to behave or look like those on their phones or other familiar devices. Some interactions were also different between other Fluke devices, further confusing participants with relevant experience.
Information Architecture (IA) needs work. The current structure didn’t always align with how users approached their tasks, and some screens felt overly dense or disorganized.

^{A participant resting the device on the table so he can more easily browse the menu while struggling with a task.}

Some Recommendations

There were many detailed recommendations down to small decisions, but here are some recommendations for the major findings that emerged:

Consider a physical redesign: Given the feedback in the sessions about the weight, which echoes customer feedback heard by SMEs, a physical redesign of the body for increased comfort and reduced weight should be prioritized. The industrial design intern was focusing her project on this problem,
Ensure consistent interactions: Standardize interactions not only across different areas of this device, but also between various Fluke devices, to enhance user familiarity and ease of use.
Align with user mental models: Consider what design changes can be made that align with these expectations to improve ease of use. Review what features
Conduct further research on the IA: With many new features coming in the next few years, it is important to consider how all of the current and future features should be organized, rather than simply adding in features to an already confusing IA.
Focus on usability enhancements: Small design adjustments can significantly improve usability. As new features are added, maintaining high usability will be crucial for user satisfaction and effectiveness.

Impact and Reflections

In the final week of my internship I presented my findings and recommendations to both Baseline and the ii900 teams. These findings provided a roadmap and prioritization of which features to address, which for Baseline including reevaluating the foundational workflow before moving on to new features. 6 months after my internship, Fluke began another round of usability testing on Baseline to benchmark changes made.

"You won over and have a huge fan base here at Fluke through this work. (You had a big impact!)"
- My Manager

“You were a real team asset and your work invaluable.” - SME

“As an engineer on the project, it’s also quite humbling to see VOC first-hand.” - Fluke Engineer

Reflections coming soon :)