ALEXANDER

CHRISTIAN

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ALEXANDER

CHRISTIAN

Navigating enterprise complexity to align stakeholders and sunset legacy tech.

Role

Principal Product Designer

Timeline

2025

Focus

Product Strategy

Change Management

UX Research

Impact

Sunset Failing Platform

Unified Management into a Path Forward

Overview

Navigating Shifts in Ford's EV Transformation

The automotive industry was undergoing a transformation, particularly with the rapid evolution of Battery Electric Vehicles. This shift presented unique challenges and opportunities for Ford and our Dealership network.

Broader Market Shifts for BEVs and Model e:

The rapid shift to BEVs disrupted traditional sales. Dealerships lacked the 'muscle memory' for this new technology. Concurrently, the transition of the primary sales resource, eSourcebook, left staff without familiar, reliable tools for accessing critical vehicle information.

Challenge

Translating Vision into Action

I was tasked with exploring, refining, and ultimately determining the future direction of the Model e Menu, a BEV-focused tablet-based sales tool for Dealership sales teams.

My Role:

My role was multifaceted, extending beyond the direct execution of design to encompass strategic exploration, stakeholder alignment, and problem-solving within a complex organizational ecosystem. My core responsibilities were directly aligned with the mandates received from leadership:

Reduce

Business Costs

Improve

BEV Sales

Increase

Sales Staff Efficiency

discovery

Synthesizing the Friction

To understand the challenges faced by sales staff and customers, I initiated a comprehensive synthesis of existing research. This approach allowed me to rapidly gain critical insights, build upon existing learnings, and avoid redundant foundational work.

Customer Interviews

Qualitative customer interviews for those who recently purchased a vehicle to understand their purchasing experience.

Feature Walkthrough is Crucial

Customers expected a thorough feature demonstration and walkthrough of the vehicle, and was considered a crucial component of their positive sales and test drive experience.

"Spot-Buy" Customers Desired Better Efficiency

"Spot-buy" customers (those making same-day purchase decisions) often felt exhausted by the lengthy purchasing process, underscoring the need for greater efficiency.

Safety & Infotainment Are Top Priorities

Customers prioritized understanding infotainment and core driving features related to safety and convenience, highlighting critical information gaps that needed to be addressed during the sales conversation.

Dealer Sales Staff Interviews

Qualitative interviews dealers to understand their experience using existing tablet sales tool, Model e Menu.

Mobile-First Urgency & Access Issues

Many sales staff lacked physical access to tablets, as they were often locked away by managers, limiting the utility of existing tablet-based digital tools. Dealers also had a strong preference for mobile based experiences.

Efficiency & Information Gaps

Sales staff rarely engaged with BEV-only tablet tools, as BEV sales represented a small fraction of their overall transactions. Meaning when the time came to need BEV specific content, the current BEV tools were out-of-sight, out-of-mind.

Inconsistent Data Processes

Sales personnel struggled to quickly and accurately track VIN-specific incentives. One sales personally maintained a physical list, which became a bottleneck for the entire team.

SME Interview & Journey Mapping

In-depth Interview and Journey Mapping sessions with experienced field agents who interacted with sales staff regularly.

Low BEV Exposure

The small percentage of BEV sales meant staff had limited exposure to dedicated tools, necessitating a solution that supported the full Ford lineup.

The BEV Transition

Selling and buying BEVs represented a radical change for both staff and customers, disrupting established expectations and creating friction.

Secret Shopper Study

Our team worked with a third-party company to purchase multiple BEV Ford vehicles to better understand the vehicle purchasing and selling experience.

Highly Variable BEV Knowledge in Sales Staff

Sales staff knowledge of BEVs varied dramatically, leading to inconsistent customer experiences and a high degree of variability in the sales process.

Inexperienced Staff Lacked Basic Understanding of BEVs

Less experienced sales personnel exhibited exceptional trouble with basic BEV concepts over traditional ICE vehicles, emphasizing the need for a reliable and accurate information source.

Comparison Process was a "Roller Coaster"

The process of comparing vehicles was highly inconsistent, marked by a roller coaster of highs and lows, indicating a lack of resources for feature comparison.

Customer Interviews

Qualitative customer interviews for those who recently purchased a vehicle to understand their purchasing experience.

Feature Walkthrough is Crucial

Customers expected a thorough feature demonstration and walkthrough of the vehicle, and was considered a crucial component of their positive sales and test drive experience.

"Spot-Buy" Customers Desired Better Efficiency

"Spot-buy" customers (those making same-day purchase decisions) often felt exhausted by the lengthy purchasing process, underscoring the need for greater efficiency.

Safety & Infotainment Are Top Priorities

Customers prioritized understanding infotainment and core driving features related to safety and convenience, highlighting critical information gaps that needed to be addressed during the sales conversation.

SME Interview & Journey Mapping

In-depth Interview and Journey Mapping sessions with experienced field agents who interacted with sales staff regularly.

Low BEV Exposure

The small percentage of BEV sales meant staff had limited exposure to dedicated tools, necessitating a solution that supported the full Ford lineup.

The BEV Transition

Selling and buying BEVs represented a radical change for both staff and customers, disrupting established expectations and creating friction.

Dealer Sales Staff Interviews

Qualitative interviews dealers to understand their experience using existing tablet sales tool, Model e Menu.

Mobile-First Urgency & Access Issues

Many sales staff lacked physical access to tablets, as they were often locked away by managers, limiting the utility of existing tablet-based digital tools. Dealers also had a strong preference for mobile based experiences.

Efficiency & Information Gaps

Sales staff rarely engaged with BEV-only tablet tools, as BEV sales represented a small fraction of their overall transactions. Meaning when the time came to need BEV specific content, the current BEV tools were out-of-sight, out-of-mind.

Inconsistent Data Processes

Sales personnel struggled to quickly and accurately track VIN-specific incentives. One sales personally maintained a physical list, which became a bottleneck for the entire team.

Secret Shopper Study

Our team worked with a third-party company to purchase multiple BEV Ford vehicles to better understand the vehicle purchasing and selling experience.

Highly Variable BEV Knowledge in Sales Staff

Sales staff knowledge of BEVs varied dramatically, leading to inconsistent customer experiences and a high degree of variability in the sales process.

Inexperienced Staff Lacked Basic Understanding of BEVs

Less experienced sales personnel exhibited exceptional trouble with basic BEV concepts over traditional ICE vehicles, emphasizing the need for a reliable and accurate information source.

Comparison Process was a "Roller Coaster"

The process of comparing vehicles was highly inconsistent, marked by a roller coaster of highs and lows, indicating a lack of resources for feature comparison.

From this research, some critical themes emerged: 

Limited VIN Resources: Dealers lacked readily accessible Ford resources for quickly and accurately providing customers with VIN-specific features and incentives.

The BEV Transition: Selling and buying BEVs represented a radical change for both staff and customers, disrupting established expectations and creating friction.

Hardware Constraints: Dealers were struggling to take advantage of mandated tablet hardware, and Model e Menu was failing to address their key pains.

This research anchored our project, defining our problem statement and driving a shift away from the confusing and misunderstood 'Model e Menu' name toward a new strategic direction.

Strategy

Sunsetting Model e Menu

Given the scale of Ford, we conducted an extensive internal "friendly-competitor" analysis to prevent redundant effort and determine the most efficient strategic path forwatd. Our goal was to verify no internal team was duplicating our work and assess if leveraging an existing solution was better than building a new one.

We engaged with three key internal teams:

Ford's Dealer Customer Onboarding Tool

A Customer onboarding tool to empower dealers and assist customers, it had good dealer reception and had potential for a unified sales & delivery tool.

Limitation: Their established product roadmap and architecture were already constrained from shifting business priorities.


Conclusion: Integration would serve as a disruption, delaying progress and add technical debt for both teams.

Re-invest in the 'Model e Menu' Tablet Experience

While Model e Menu was experience utilization issues, it had launched to modest positive feedback.

Limitation: The tool was saddled with significant technical and design debt from its experimental history. Upgrading it would require the same resources as a new build, but without a fresh foundation.


Conclusion: Resource-intensive, design-debt experience was not viable for long-term growth.

Ford's eLearning Platform

Dealers already utilized this resource for training, and we wouldn't be introducing a new tool and would have access to their existing content.

Limitation: Mixed-to-negative dealer feedback suggested potential user adoption challenges.


Conclusion: Platform was too premature in development to support a live sales experience.

Ford's Dealer Customer Onboarding Tool

A Customer onboarding tool to empower dealers and assist customers, it had good dealer reception and had potential for a unified sales & delivery tool.

Limitation: Their established product roadmap and architecture were already constrained from shifting business priorities.


Conclusion: Integration would serve as a disruption, delaying progress and add technical debt for both teams.

Ford's eLearning Platform

Dealers already utilized this resource for training, and we wouldn't be introducing a new tool and would have access to their existing content.

Limitation: Mixed-to-negative dealer feedback suggested potential user adoption challenges.


Conclusion: Platform was too premature in development to support a live sales experience.

Re-invest in the 'Model e Menu' Tablet Experience

While Model e Menu was experience utilization issues, it had launched to modest positive feedback.

Limitation: The tool was saddled with significant technical and design debt from its experimental history. Upgrading it would require the same resources as a new build, but without a fresh foundation.


Conclusion: Resource-intensive, design-debt experience was not viable for long-term growth.

This analysis confirmed that a new, purpose-built Dealer Sales Tool (DST) was the most effective path forward. This approach, strategically positioned outside of legacy constraints, directly addressed dealer pain points and provided the necessary fresh, user-centric foundation to meet our strategic mandates.

Solution

Problem Statement, Benefits & MVP Use Case

Problem Statement, Solution, & Benefits

Built on our research, we distilled the core problem and defined the strategic direction for the new "Dealer Sales Tool".

Problem Statement:

Sales consultants waste time and hurt satisfaction using existing tools that offer VIN-specific vehicle information that is difficult to find, outdated, or incomplete.

Proposed Solution:

Solution:

The Dealer Sales Tool would be a mobile-friendly application tailored to our sales consultants, empowering them to quickly reference VIN-specific data, match features to customer needs, and close sales more confidently.

Proposed Solution:

The Dealer Sales Tool would be a mobile-friendly application tailored to our sales consultants, empowering them to quickly reference VIN-specific data, match features to customer needs, and close sales more confidently.

Dealer Benefits:

Improved efficiency through fewer systems and handoffs.

Increased sales through a single, reliable source of truth on VIN-specific product knowledge.

Easier onboarding for newer employees

Customer Benefits:

Improved Customer Satisfaction through less time spent in the dealership and interactions with more knowledgeable sales staff.

Ability to review sales material at home at their leisure, fostering a more informed purchase decision.

Better-informed purchase decisions due to accurate and comprehensive information.

Ford Benefits:

Improved sales by empower sales consultants through new functionality

Enhanced ability to quickly inform sales consultants directly of major changes.

Reduced business costs on a failing platform that was utilizing development resources.

“This isn’t the Ford Sales Tool, it’s not the Customer Buying Tool, we’re here to help Dealers where they need it.”

Mission Statement

conclusion

Forging a Unified Path Forward

Navigating the complex organizational dynamics at Ford, our team heavily prioritized stakeholder alignment, we used iterative, low-fidelity prototyping as a crucial tool to secure buy-in, focus discussions on core functionality, and maintain strategic alignment across the organization.


We successfully engaged and built consensus with three primary groups, each with distinct needs: Model e Business (focused on BEV sales), the Ford Field Team (advocating for practical dealer solutions), and Engineering and Product (seeking resolution on the resource-draining Model e Menu).

Through facilitated meetings, research presentations, and prototype iteration, we achieved a definitive consensus on the project's future:

Key Strategic Outcomes

Sunset Model e Menu: The Model e Menu tablet experience was retired due to technical and design debt, allowing resources to be focused exclusively on the new DST solution.

Align on Pilot Metrics: Established measurable business metrics to quantify success and impact for the Dealer Sales Tool (DST) Pilot program.

Validate MVP Prototype: Planned remote co-creation sessions with dealers to validate the DST MVP before proceeding to full development.

Want to learn more about the Dealer Sales Tool? Check out the case study below: