Battery Life Diagnostic Tool: Boosting Enterprise Laptop Performance through UX-Driven Insights

Led UX design and research for a 10+ person agile team, delivering a tool with a 100% usability rating that pinpointed root causes of battery degradation. The solution enabled engineers to optimize enterprise builds, with the potential to nearly double IT-Build PC battery life and expand business value.

Battery Life Diagnostic Tool production interface

Background

Enterprise users increasingly demand better laptop performance, with all-day battery life ranking as a top priority. However, custom IT build environments often degrade battery performance, leaving IT teams without clear insights into the root causes.

To address this, the Battery Life Diagnostic Tool was developed to help IT engineers identify which background processes or applications are causing excessive power drain. Unlike standard power benchmarking tools that only measure overall consumption, this tool pinpoints specific culprits, such as apps that keep the CPU from reaching low power states, allowing for more targeted optimizations.

Testimonial

" Thank you very much for your dedication, effort and help for the Battery Life tool. Your expertise helped our team understand our customers’ needs and improve the tools’ impact."

— Developer Teammate

My Role

UX Design Lead, Lead Researcher, Design Coach
I led UX strategy, facilitated research and design activities, mentored an internal UX-aspiring partner, and collaborated with a 10+ person multidisciplinary agile team including product, engineering, and sales professionals.

Process

Discovery & Alignment

  • Facilitated a Design Thinking / Innovation workshop with engineering, product, and sales

  • Surfaced assumptions, aligned on tool goals, and kicked off collaborative ideation

Workshop Whiteboard

Whiteboarding alongside mentee

Initial Mockup

Future state vision (from Workshop actitvity)

Design & Expert Evaluation

  • Created and refined multiple interactive prototypes

    • Multi-step wizard for diagnostics workflow

    • Visual reporting dashboard to highlight power-hungry processes

    • Data-rich report: surfaced key battery culprits via clear visuals

  • Conducted expert evaluation of the initial Beta/Demo version

Initial Prototype - Start Screen

Beta Version - Start Screen

Initial Prototype - Reporting Feature

Beta Version - Reporting Feature

Iterative User Validation from Targeted Segments (PC deployment engineers and IT team managers)

  • Conducted two rounds of hybrid user feedback sessions (interviews + usability testing)

  • Evaluated targeted UX benchmarks to track ease of use, clarity, and reporting feature value

High-level UX Plan Timeline

User Feedback Sessions Overview

Key Results

  • Validated user need: Battery performance challenges were widespread in IT-managed systems

  • Process understood: 100% of participants successfully navigated the tool workflow

  • High report utility: All users found the diagnostics reporting feature valuable for decision-making

Enterprise Battery Life Tool - Initial Baseline Metrics

Impact

  • Sales enablement: Tool used as a value-add differentiator in enterprise PC sales, with the potential to nearly double IT-Build PC battery life.

  • Performance Optimization: Internal IT teams used findings to boost enterprise battery life

  • Validated market fit: Tool usefulness and value affirmed by users across multiple geographies and segments

  • Built UX capacity: Coached and trained an internal partner, extending UX reach in the business

Testimonial

" I wanted to say how grateful I am for the opportunity to work with you, it's been a pleasure! Having the opportunity to learn from you has made a substantial impact on my experience...I greatly appreciate the collaboration we shared, the brainstorming, the long hours, the jokes, and the smart tips and tricks you shared with me! "

— UX Mentee