UX Design · 2020
Scout In-Car Experience
Core navigation and in-car experience design for Norman & Co's connected vehicle platform.
Company
Norman & Co
Role
Lead UX Designer
Year
2020
Platform
Automotive
Category
UX Design
Background
Norman & Co was preparing to launch their first connected vehicle platform — Scout. The in-car experience needed to feel intuitive enough for a first-time driver while delivering the depth of information a power user expects.
I joined as Lead UX Designer 18 months before launch, responsible for the entire in-cabin digital experience: navigation, climate, media, and vehicle diagnostics.
Design Principles
We defined three non-negotiable principles before any design work began:
- Eyes-forward first — critical actions must never require the driver to look down for more than 1.5 seconds
- Zero learning curve — any new interface should be operable within 60 seconds of first interaction
- Context-aware defaults — the system should anticipate state (commute, highway, parking) and surface relevant controls
“Scout feels like the car already knows where I want to go. It's the first in-car system I've used that doesn't make me feel like I need a manual.”
— Beta tester, Norman & Co early access programme
What I Learned
Designing for constrained, high-stakes environments — where a wrong tap could be dangerous — fundamentally changed how I think about interaction design. Some key takeaways:
- Touch targets in automotive UI should be a minimum of 48×48dp to account for road vibration
- Glanceable information requires extreme hierarchy discipline — one primary data point per screen state
- Testing in a moving vehicle surfaces failure modes that no amount of lab testing will reveal
