ExpenseThis
An Apple Watch app that lets users file expenses under 10 seconds
In Summer 2015, as a Product Management Intern on Concur Mobile team, I worked on making expense filing easy. Our solution enhances the capability of Concur platform, using context-aware wearable computing and automation, to simplify expense filing user flows.
Limited details shared on this page due to the sensitive nature of information, as per the signed NDA.
Type
Team project with Concur Labs Team
Project Aspects
Product Ownership, Project Management, Full-stack Software Development, UX Design, Presentation
My Role
Product Manager (Ideation to Final Presentation)
Contributed to Ideation, UX Design, Product/Project Management and Presentation
Timeline
June - Aug 2015 (8 weeks)
The Problem
After a business trip, it’s difficult to recall the details of every meal. How many clients attended? Did you use a personal credit card, and, if so, which expenses were only for business?
Our research shows that submitting expense reports on time is the number one pain point of Travel & Expense (T&E) industry.
The Solution
With ExpenseThis app, you simply tell your Apple Watch “Expense this.” and your expense is automatically sent to Concur in real-time.
Deliverables
We developed an Apple Watch app called ExpenseThis that utilized Yodlee API and Factual API to track and create expenses. Our node.js server enabled automated expense filing. I pitched the idea to the top executives at Concur and was selected as the "Best Intern, Summer 2015" for my work on this and AttendIt project.
Process
Brainstorming for ideas/concepts/pain points
We were given a set of project directions such as Apple Watch, sharing and NFC. We started by brainstorming for ideas and pain points in the ecosystem to prepare a list of projects. Affinity diagrams were used during the process.
Data about key pain points and their impact in T&E industry
Next, I did market research to gather data for validating each project concept and worked with key stakeholders to gather requirements.
This shaped my understanding of T&E personas (not shared here), use cases and various scenarios.
I created user flows to reflect user stories proposed.
User Story Proposal Document
(recreated) User Flow Shorthand of MVP
Research. Develop. Validate. Repeat.
I used Jakob Nielsen's 10 heuristic principles to evaluate the MVP, prepared test cases (golden path + edge cases) to reveal gaps in the prototype and presented it to our managers for feedback. Eventually, I was made to pitch the product with go-to-market strategy and business plans to higher executives at Concur and this is what they have to say:
“Tap - Speak - Done. I love it!
”
Secret sauce: Location from Apple Watch is mapped onto the last transaction on your credit card with a timestamp; an expense is created and sent to Concur as soon as the transaction record is found.
Final Thoughts
A large amount of my work involved validating ideas and modifying roadmaps using data from internal analytics, data science teams and through market research. During my first 8 weeks of internship, I managed development teams of both ExpenseThis and AttendIt involving 5 developers and 2 designers.
I used data from sources present in the ecosystem in order to make informed decisions while defining a product roadmap. Power of LEAN Startup mentality and Agile methodology were the key takeaways from this experience.