MULTI-TOOL REDESIGN

When tasked with revolutionizing a best selling multi-tool, I led my team to Oregon’s heartland. What we learned brought about weightless and significant change. Over the course of eight months, we worked with industrial designers, engineers, and the executive team to push the limits of multi-tool carriability and re-direct the company from an engineering-focused approach toward a holistic experience one. When several iterative designs were falling short of users’ expectations, I created a qualitative study that would allow me to build variance charts to drive the team in a new direction. In all, our work uncovered over new 200 component ideas, developed 3 new tool designs, and inspired a varied-channel service strategy that solved for Leatherman’s biggest problem in carriability: losing the tool. All new tools made by the company are now expected to solve for the ritual, celebratory, and competitive elements of use in addition to their own mechanical wizardry.

THE DETAILS: 

Exploratory Research    For the initial 3 rounds of qualitative research, we designed all research plans, recruited interviewees, led stakeholder and user research (including in-store and on-site visits with groups and individuals), collaborated with client engineers and design team, developed competitive analysis, design requirements, qualitative/quantitative metrics for success (including, “Opens bottles like Whoa.”), and created customer journeys/experience maps.

​Developing Prototypes    I led the company’s design team through a three week design sprint, leading exploratory user-research, concept modeling workshops, and prototype usability testing in the field. My research/strategy team developed a varied-channel product design strategy (websites, offline channels, and product) based on business goals and user preferences: We came back with new design ideas for the multi-tool market–several were revolutionary (those, I can’t share, though)​.