Have you ever imagined what it’s like to work for more than 10 hours a day without even having anywhere to do your most basic needs, like drinking water or going to the bathroom, and still not knowing how much you’ll be able to get out at the end of the day? That’s the reality of most application delivery workers.

Because of that, when we observed the growing "Uberisation" of work and the protests in the period of the pandemic Covid-19, in which application delivery demanded improvements to the class, we decided to delve into the topic during the project.

In a survey conducted by the Journal of Labor and Human Development it was found that during the pandemic, 62% of workers were working more than 9 hours a day with 51.9% working 7 days a week.

Challenge: How can we help app deliverers who are dissatisfied with the current landscape that delivery platforms provide?

Based on the main demands of the protests, our initial expectation was to develop a solution that would bring greater stability to the delivery worker’s job — something that proved to be more complex than we imagined.

Below is the matrix where we raised the certainties, doubts and hypotheses we had when starting the project (which was later complemented by inputs from the surveys):

There is no lack of available material on the subject. From articles on various news portals, surveys, videos made by the delivery workers themselves, to documentaries. Most of them discuss the precariousness of work, "Uberization" and the situation stressed by the pandemic that culminated in the protests.

One of them is the short documentary “Lives delivered”. It talks about food app deliverers (iFood, Rappi, Uber) who work by bicycle:

After collecting the data in a secondary research and building our hypothesis Matrix, we continued the research/discovery phase by interviewing 8 delivery workers who helped us to understand the real problems in this context, such as:

• Income unpredictability.

“When the demand is good, we take advantage and work up to 16 hours, to be sure, because we don’t know if tomorrow will be good again.”

• Lack of support from the delivery company (even when they are disconnected from the platform for no clear reason).
• Waiting time at the restaurant until an order comes out and then at the customer until they pick it up.
• Lack of quality of life due to spending too much time on the street and consequently little time with the family.
• They do not have support spots (water, shelter, etc…).

“The apps should provide a support spot for us, because we are on the street, there is no bathroom, there is no place to stop and wait for orders… there had to be support for us to be able to drink water, have a table for lunch . We sit on the sidewalk so we can eat. Even a place to charge your cell phone is difficult to find.”

Recording of the interviews conducted with delivery workers:

Next, we spoke with 4 restaurants (owners and managers). It is clear that the biggest dissatisfaction is the amount of fees charged by the applications, which can reach up to 30% of the order value. However, despite this discontent, they remain working with the applications because if they stop, the number of orders drops dramatically.

“The demand from iFood is better, we’re kind of dependent on them.”

There were also issues related to the lack of transparency in the communication with the platforms, the mismatch between the order being ready to leave and the time the delivery worker arrives (either before or after) and the loss of orders (which generates a certain distrust in the relationship between restaurant and delivery).

Here we show all the problems found (workers, in red, and restaurants in green):

Persona: Marcos — 32-year-old man, low class and only family income

After the interviews, we were able to draw the Persona and journey of our user, the delivery worker.

“It is necessary to take advantage of the opportunities that appear to achieve what I want for me and my family”

Since losing his job 8 months ago, Marcos has found a way to support himself through the apps. Although his journey is flexible, he usually follows the same routine every day: he wakes up at around 7 am and has breakfast, a moment he shares in the company of his wife and child.

At around 9 am, it leaves Grajaú towards Interlargos, a journey which takes approximately 30 minutes. After traveling a distance of approximately 13 kilometers, it is positioned at strategic points such as the mall, gas stations or the market in the region.

Usually, around 11 am, the first orders start to arrive. The last ones do not have much forecast, as he only returns home after reaching his daily goal, which is around U$35.00 to U$50.00. To achieve this goal, he works about 12 hours a day, but if he notices that the day is paying off, he spends more time on the street:

As “time is money”, he feels anguished when he is idle, something that happens quite often whether he is waiting for orders to arrive, dishes to be prepared, or customers to receive them. This means wasting more time on the street and less time with family.

Despite these breaks, Marcos cannot reconcile them with moments when he could rest and get ready to prepare for the next deliveries, whether stretching his legs, eating or even charging his cell phone. For that, it only counts on the good will of the people who work in the restaurants.

At the same time that Marcos likes to work autonomously, because he feels free, he would like some support from platforms and restaurants, after all, he feels that the hard work is what he is doing.

We mapped the entire delivery journey during a working day, with the aim of helping to understand where solution proposals would come in:

After analyzing all the results, we have proposed a solution that was viable for the platforms to consider and that attended both, the deliverers and the restaurants, a program of support spots.

In this canvas "Product Vision Board" we give the vision of what we are trying to propose as a solution to some of the identified problems:

The idea is that the platform creates a program where restaurants could register as partner support spots, inserting the benefits that they can and want to offer, such as water, restrooms, food, space to charge the cell phone, etc. In return, these restaurants would receive benefits such as a percentage reduction in the amount of order fees, or periods with reduced delivery values.

For the restaurant, in addition to monetary benefits, the proposal also aims to build a better relationship with delivery workers, since when they request benefits, their profile would be displayed to the attendant.

On the worker’s side, the benefit is evident. Not only for moments between deliveries, but also when they need to wait for the order to be ready, having a better prepared space to receive them.

Finally, for platforms, we believe it would be a solution with high potential to make restaurants and delivery workers more satisfied, increasing the NPS (Net Promoter Score) and consequently with both more satisfied, end customers would have a better experience — everyone wins .

Below we list all the benefits mapped for all involved points:

We then worked on a prototype of how the solution could materialize, from the worker’s perspective:

If you work for a delivery platform and are interested in talking to us to exchange what we learned, we are very open to that! Just get in touch through my LinkedIn.

Main takeaways

• There is a lot that happens behind the scenes after a simple tap to finalize a food order in a delivery app.
• Knowing the routine of the people who do the delivery service helped us to further value this precarious work that is increasingly present today.
• How inattention to one or more ends of a chain can affect the rest of the chain.
• And finally, as in the quest to introduce new services into our lives, companies cannot fail to look at the most basic needs of those involved.

References and recommended materials

• Documentaries: Documentaries about working for platforms
• Article: UX study to improve the quality of work of Brazilian day laborers
• Feature: Documentary discusses the precariousness after the reform
• Feature: GREG NEWS | DELIVERY
• Research: Working conditions of delivery people via digital platform during Covid-19
• Feature: Discover the challenges of a delivery person during a pandemic period
• Documentary: GIG — A Uberização do Trabalho (Trailer)
• Documentary: VIDAS ENTREGUES

I’m now one of them. Around October 2020, I was in my 646 ft2 apartment in São Paulo, Brazil, that barely received even a minimum amount of natural sunlight and trapped indoors for around 8 months because of COVID quarantine (but at least being able to work from home). I looked around and thought to myself, “Why am I still living here?”. My apartment’s lease contract would end in a couple of months and I had around $2000 in furniture that was somehow holding me back to move somewhere with more open space, nature and sunlight. Thus, I decided to sell it all, and after the contract was over, started (with my girlfriend who was also working remotely) to live a nomad life.

For the past 8 months we’ve been living in a different city (urban, rural, beach) every 5 weeks (so far that’s the length that has worked out the best for us). For us, the first search option that came to mind for hospitality in this case was Airbnb, and it has worked out. But as soon as we started moving to the first places, we started to understand that our needs for a place to stay wouldn’t be as simple (or just the same) as for when you are traveling for tourism. At this point, Airbnb was still working its way through its product to adapt to one of the trends that profoundly impacted their industry. So as a good Product Manager, I decided to use my skills to help find the gaps where Airbnb’s product could evolve to even better accommodate this market that probably won’t stop growing anytime soon.

One of the top 5 struggles for nomads on the road is availability of items that are commonly available at home. Also, Digital nomads prefer to work at their home or accommodation over anywhere else (23% of nomads surveyed). Digital nomads stated they were generally willing to pay a substantial additional charge for a guesthouse, BnB, hostel, or hotel properly equipped for work (fast, reliable internet, comfortable chair, desk, electrical outlets, atmosphere conducive to working). However, the host should ensure the amenities are properly advertised and then validated objectively in customer reviews for the property. In the absence of a sufficient workspace and fast, reliable Wi-Fi, this group of nomads then opted for either coworking space or a café [1]. For us, the pain points came down to these five below:

1. Having intermittent internet connection or low speed, unable to do video calls.
2. Missing out on some basic kitchen utensils for cooking at home.
3. Not having ergonomic chairs and tables for working long hours.
4. Not having an easy way to wash our clothes.
5. Not having enough privacy for long periods of time (shared backyards, for example).

So, let’s do some benchmarking on Airbnb’s app:

#1 Having intermittent internet connection or low speed, unable to do video calls.

According to a FlexJobs survey, over half of digital nomads (52%) rated finding reliable Wi-Fi as one of the top challenges of the nomadic lifestyle [3]. Airbnb lets you choose homes that have Wi-Fi, but that’s not enough when you are working from home. For us, it was even more delicate because we do video calls during the whole day. We could ask the host for the Wi-Fi speed afterwards, but even that doesn’t solve the problem, because one thing is the speed you have hired from the internet provider, a second thing is the speed delivered (that can be checked by websites like fast.com). Also, sometimes the speed was good, but the internet was intermittent, which meant it would drop and come back many times during the day, which while you are in the middle of a meeting makes it very problematic.

PS: I’ve noticed Airbnb asks the reviewers to say if the internet was good for video calls, but they are not translating that in the interface yet.

One (of many) possible solutions: bringing the information provided by the guests when reviewing a house, about the internet being good enough to do video calls to the information section of the room page.

#2 Missing out on some basic kitchen equipment for cooking at home.

Cooking is a must for anyone who is staying longer periods in a place. Even if you are not the type of person who likes cooking, it can get very expensive to purchase every meal out. But for us, who are vegans and try to cook as much as possible, it’s a must for adequate prep and cooking space and equipment to be prepared for it. When I mean prepared, I don’t mean anything fancy, but it needs to have things such as: a blender, pots & pans, roasting pan, etc… Currently, in Airbnb you can say you want a place with a kitchen, but that is it. It’s very common to get to a place and have to either adapt around it (when possible) or having to buy or ask the host for more kitchen utensils.

One (of many) possible solutions: giving the option for the host to indicate the specific kitchen equipment and show it on the information section of the room page.

#3 Not having ergonomic chairs and tables for working long hours.

Working long hours on a wooden chair can cause a lot of discomfort and pain. There is a way to filter this out, which in theory should help, but in practice those two examples below are indicated as “dedicated workspaces”. It ranges from an ergonomic Herman Miller chair to a wooden stool.

One (of many) possible solutions, from the guest perspective (after the host input) is being able to search by the number of chairs and tables available for working on (like it’s already done for beds). Also showing in the information section of the room page if the dedicated workspace has proper chairs for working long hours.

#4 Not having an easy way to wash our clothes.

One thing that is really hard to work around is not having an easy way to wash our clothes. According to A Brother Abroad’s survey [1], 66% of digital nomads prefer to stay in a single place for 3 to 6 months. In our case, it’s 5 to 8 weeks, so it’s very complicated to bring enough clothes to last more than a couple of weeks. To help with this, there is a “washer filter” which works relatively well, but I say “relatively” because as we have noticed, many times we end up missing out on a place that does not show up in the results when the filter is on, when in practice there is a way to work it out with the host. For example: the host has a washer that is generally only available for the house cleaner, but they make it available upon request; they live nearby and can share their washing machine; or even using a third-party washing service that they already have a relationship with for the linens and towels. So in the end, we don’t use this filter frequently and end up having to ask every host before making a reservation, if there is a way to accommodate us (and many times there is a way).

One (of many) possible solutions: orient the host to indicate when it does not have an exclusive washing machine for the guests, but one that can be made available upon request, and allow for the property be included in the search when the “washer filter” is on.

#5 Not having enough privacy for long periods of time (shared backyards for example).

I can choose to have an entire place, but that doesn’t mean the place is going to be completely private. What do I mean for private? Basically, we stay in some homes “Entire place by Airbnb’s standards”, but where the host would share the same backyard, for example. Not being in a pandemic would be less of a problem, but during one it gets a bit annoying. We would have to wear masks every time we went to the backyard to get some sunlight. Or if the hosts had dogs, that meant having to give attention to their dogs when sometimes I just wanted to lay down and relax.

One (of many) possible solutions: give the option to indicate when it’s a shared backyard.

#6 (extra). There is an extra point which is, of course, pricing.

Even though Airbnb seems to be incentivizing the hosts to do discounts, from our experience most of them are still pretty far from a fair price for a longer stay (>4 weeks). There are several advantages to the host for offering a reduced price (intensified by COVID) for longer reservations:

1. Reduce dependency upon oscillating tourism demand to achieve the desired occupancy rate.
2. Reduce volume servicing multiple interested parties and bookings per month.
3. Long stay guest are more prone to take care of the place, since they are staying longer in it.
4. Reduce volume of check ins and check-outs.
5. Reduce physical contact with multiple parties (COVID reasons).

And some of them just noticed the advantages when they do the math. So again, in practice, we end up having to negotiate the pricing of many stays until it gets to a price that makes more sense for a long stay. We have already got to almost 30% lower than the listed “monthly discount price”.

One (of many) possible solutions: show these advantages to lowering the price for longer stays to incentivize hosts doing a more aggressive pricing on monthly and longer stays.

Workaround solution: we created a Google Forms checklist (feel free to duplicate it and use it for yourself 🙂), that we share with the host, which covers most of these pain points that we (and probably many other Digital Nomads) have. But of course, it would be great to have an opportunity to work it out with the product team at Airbnb.

Next steps:

• If you are a digital nomad, feel free to reach for questions, tips or even to share your experience with us (and help us improve this checklist), that would be awesome!
• If you work for Airbnb, I’m very interested in going deeper into what our experience has taught us and help to improve the #1 product that is enabling these experiences in the first place!
• Ideally, I’d lead a Product Discovery process with other digital nomads to better shape a more scalable solution.
• Anyone else, would love to hear your comments, thoughts and insights.

[1] 63 Surprising Digital Nomad Statistics in 2021 — by A Brother Abroad

[2] 15 Digital Nomad Statistics and Exciting Trends [2021 Update] — by Project Untethered

[3] Digital Nomad Survey: Insights into the Remote Lifestyle — by FlexJobs

[4] Digital Nomad Statistics and Future Projections [Infographic] — by Nomadific

In a 2020 survey, 62% of respondents reported experiencing some degree of anxiety (SingleCare, 2020). An estimated 31% of all adults will experience an anxiety disorder at some point in their life (Anxiety and Depression Association of America, 2020).

About one-third of people around the world reported feeling stressed, worried, and/or angry in 2019 (Gallup). In the general population, adults with work stress or private-life stress have a 1.1-fold to 1.6-fold increased risk of incident coronary heart disease and stroke (Nature Reviews Cardiology, 2018).

Meditation has innumerous benefits already proven by science, such as: it reduces stress, controls anxiety, improves sleep and enhances self-awareness.

Its benefits, in a way, are widespread. It does not require specialized equipment or space. You can practice with just a few minutes daily. But even though, some people have a hard time incorporating it in their daily lives.

With that in mind, for the past few weeks I worked on this case study, using a Design for behavior change approach and I'd like to share it with you.

Define the problem:

Vision/Mission Statement: Improve wellbeing and consciousness of millions by helping them fight anxiety and other common modern life mental disorders.

Key result: Getting people to develop a life-long daily meditation habit.

Metrics and goals:

• Increasing the number of daily (DAU) and/or weekly (WAU) active users.
• Start measuring the daily user happiness or satisfaction and grow it substantially from when it started to be measured and 21 days after (days it takes to make it a habit).

The goals for these metrics would depend on the current user base of the meditation app that is incorporating it.

Key Actor:

By exploring the cycle of technology adoption popularized by Geoffrey A. Moore in his classic book Crossing the Chasm, we are able to understand where our target segment is located in its curve.

Innovators:

• People that work in the mental health industry
• Digital influencers in the field
• Technology enthusiasts

Early Adopters:

• Already have a regular meditation habit
• Ambassadors of the practice
• Digitized

Early Majority (*where I suppose the big meditation apps are struggling with):

• Have meditated at least once
• Say they would like to meditate more, but have not yet developed a habit
• Even though they know the benefits of the practice
• Digitized

Late Majority:

• Could or not have meditated at least once
• Are not totally convinced of the benefits of the practice, or if they are, they think it’s not for them
• Have some level of digitization

Laggards:

• Probably have never tried to meditate
• They don’t know or are not convinced of the benefits of meditation
• Not very digitized

Key Action: Complete a meditation session at least once per day.

Hypothesis for behavior change: By helping [people that already see a benefit in meditation but struggle to practice], to start [meditating on a daily basis], we will [encourage them towards a life-long meditation habit that will increase their internal happiness and satisfaction].

Explore the context:

So I took a step back and phrased the challenge as: How might we help people that know the benefits of meditation but have not been able yet to develop a daily habit?

With the initial hypotheses in place, I conducted the research in these 3 phases (which had their results added to the matrix below):

• Desk research
• Recruiting & Quantitative Survey
• Qualitative Interviews

After understanding better about the context at hand, I was able to map out what are the micro-behaviors that lead the user to the target action (complete a meditation session once a day).

Who is the behavior persona:

• Experience with similar actions: brushing teeth, doing sports are similar actions people are used to doing, in terms of a daily habit and a frequent practiced activity with some benefits that resembles meditation ones.
• Experience with similar products: Headspace, Insight Timer, cell phone alarm clock are examples of apps used with the same purpose. The problem with alarm clocks is being too annoying, and the problems with the meditation apps notifications is that is too easy to dismiss.
• Relationship with the company/brand: (it depends on how they got to know their meditation app).
• Existing motivations towards the targeted action: These people say meditation helps them have more calm, focus and less anxiety. They usually know people that have a daily habit of meditation.
• Hard barriers to action: the rush of the daily activities or the tiredness at night are the main obstacles. Also the cellphone with its notifications and distractions.

Benchmarking onboarding, practice and reminder enablers :

I wanted to understand how the most popular apps were currently dealing with helping to create a meditation habit. So below I listed the pros and cons from a habit formation perspective

Headspace’s Pros:

• Clearly states the benefits of the practice in the onboarding.
• Uses a bit of a social proof in the onboarding.
• Asks for the benefits the user is looking for during onboarding (even though the translation of some items are broken).
• Invites to create a meditation habit.
• Uses well crafted breathing exercise experience to promote “instant benefit” during onboarding (asking how the user feels afterwards) — even though the vibration while counting the breaths is really annoying.
• Uses a number progress counter to keep track of the progress and invoke a sense of investment.

Headspace’s Cons:

• Uses a "paywall" right after inviting to create a meditation habit (before actually giving any benefit).
• Invites to create a meditation habit, but it does not ask to activate a reminder.
• After the onboarding meditation it doesn’t ask anymore how the user feels after the practice, losing a chance to evoke instant benefits.
• Even though it uses a number progress counter, it does not have a clear goal.
• Every time you come back to the app you have many options of themes (it has a favorite and recent section but not in a manner to help with cultivating a habit).
• "Get some headspace" is the label on the reminder to meditate. Losing an opportunity to evoke any better psychological cues.

Calm’s Pros:

• Asks for the benefits the user is looking for during onboarding.

Calm’s Cons:

• Before having a chance to give any benefit to the user (only a simples sell of its features) asks for signing up for a subscription.
• Incomplete onboarding. After signing up, you are left in the home screen of the app with many options of meditation to pick from.
• Does not try to prompt the user to activate a reminder to help to remember to meditate (and the setting to do so it is quite hidden).
• The label on the reminder to meditate is a simple "Mindfulness Reminder" with a generic benefit, when it could have used the benefit stated in the onboarding or any stronger cues.
• After meditation practice is done, there is no clear sense of progress right away. Could have asked how the user is feeling afterwards, for example.

Ten Percent Happier ‘s Pros:

• Asks your level of your meditation to help shape the experience.
• Asks for the benefits the user is looking for during onboarding.
• Prompts you to pick the period and time you want to meditate and sets a time reminder.
• Gives an intro video helping to break the user out of any past negative experiences.
• Every meditation practice has a video before starting to help understand the practice better.
• Great prompt showing sense of progress after the meditation is completed.

Ten Percent Happier ‘s Cons:

• After a fine onboarding, leaves you at the home screen with many options of meditation themes to pick from.
• After meditation practice is done, there is no clear sense of progress right away. Could have asked how the user is feeling afterwards, for example.
• Aks for subscribing (even though it has a trial option) before giving any clear benefits.
• Simples meditation reminder "It’s time for Ten Percent. Here’s your reminder to meditate."

Insight Timer’s Pros:

• You can try the app without facing a subscription paywall.
• Great check in and check out feature to help the user recognize the immediate benefits.
• Good sense of progress after meditation is completed.

Insight Timer’s Cons:

• Zero onboarding, not helping the user in any way to have a good start.
• You start landing in the home screen overflowed with options to pick from.
• Does not help create a reminder for the practice (it’s quite hidden in the settings).
• Simples notification trigger "Insight Timer. Meditation Reminder", not using the opportunity to do a good cue to bring the user back to the app.
• At the same time it’s awesome all the meditation bells you can pick from, it’s also an overload of options to choose before starting a practice. Could have used more defaults combining with hiding some fancy setups behind a settings button, for example.

Positiv’s Pros:

• Asks for the benefits the user is looking for during onboarding.
• Asks your level of your meditation to help shape the experience.

Positiv’s Cons:

• Subscription paywall (even though it has a trial option) before giving any clear benefits.
• After signing up, you are left in the home screen of the app with many options of meditation to pick from.
• It asks you to rate the meditation, but loses the opportunity to ask you how you feel afterwards.
• "Random" reminders prompted that doesn’t necessarily have to do with what I picked in the onboarding.
• Doesn’t help to create a meditation reminder right after meditating.

Behavior diagnostic:

From my understanding of the micro-behavior journey, the research, behavior persona and current solution benchmarks, I found that the main obstacles (in order that they happen) are:

1. Deciding to try to meditate daily.

2. Choosing the best time to do it.

3. Being reminded to meditate at the chosen time and not prefer to do something else.

4. Opening the meditation app without getting caught up by the notifications and distractions.

5. Deciding the meditation app, theme and duration of the practice.

Create the intervention:

Where do we need to bring an intervention/nudge?

1. Decides to try to create a meditation habit.

2. Choose the time (or right before activity) to do it.

3. Reminds to meditate.

4. Getting the cellphone and not get distracted so easily.

5. Setting up the practice app, duration and theme.

Tactics to support the action:

Based on the CREATE action funnel by Steve Wendel and proven tactics to support the action, I raised ideas of solutions to each one of the possible drops for the main micro-behavior obstacles listed above.

Implementation into the product:

Two Models drove the insights I raised after the diagnostic:

First is the Fogg Behavior Model, where it says the success for a person to take action is driven by raising motivation and increasing ability (making it easier to do).

Secondly, by The Hook Model by Nir Eyal where it describes “a loop” of steps that must be followed in order to build a habit. After a trigger (cue), and an action (complete a meditation session) a variable reward and a feeling of investment will help the user come back the next time.

Here are some of the main insights driven by the diagnostic:

1. Reminding the initial drive to start meditating and the short & long term benefits could increase the motivation.
2. Having clear statements of what is meditation, could help avoid thoughts of ”I can’t do it” or ”I’m not doing it right”, increasing ability.
3. Being flexible about a specific time to do it or duration to overcome thoughts of “not having time” or ”I can’t do it right now”, also increasing ability.
4. Having a preset of theme and duration, to avoid choice paradox (and going directly to the practice screen), can also increase the ability to start the practice.
5. Help the person to feel the immediate benefits by asking how it’s feeling before and after the practice can create a sort of variable reward.

Low fidelity prototype:

Medium fidelity prototype:

Closing thoughts:

Conclusion:

Meditation has a number of benefits that helps to deal with some of the most common problems at an individual level, and there are some great meditation apps out there that do an awesome job in terms of content, experience and design, but they look far off in terms of helping people that have not yet developed a daily meditation habit. This is a problem, but it also has its optimistic side, which means that there is a big room of opportunity through those already popular apps to make meditation reach even more people, more frequently, therefore improving the life of millions. I hope this brief product case reaches those companies, and we are able to deepen this discussion.

Next steps:

• Connect with Headspace, TenPercentHappier, InsightTimer, Calm, Positiv and many other big meditation apps to work with them to overcome this habit barrier.
• Speak with many people that either face these challenges when trying to build a meditation habit or that have already overcome it, to get some feedback and improve the proposed solution.
• Would like to turn this prototype into a working solution, so finding a way to do that either through existing apps or coding it myself :D
• Here is my LinkedIn, don't hesitate in reaching out!

Acknoledgments:

• A very special thanks to Isabella Paschuini to not only presenting me this framework, but also for guiding and giving feedbacks all along the way.
• Beatriz Desenzi, for helping me with the medium fidelity prototype.
• And everyone else who colaborated responding the survey, doing the interviews and giving feedbacks all along: Viviane Delvaux, Luís Sertori, Pedro Cavalcante, and many others. Thank you!

Já imaginou o que é trabalhar por mais de 10 horas por dia sem nem mesmo ter onde realizar suas necessidades mais básicas, como beber água ou ir ao banheiro, e ainda não saber quanto vai conseguir tirar no final do dia? Essa é a realidade de boa parte dos entregadores de aplicativos.

Frente a isso, ao observarmos a crescente “​uberização​” do trabalho e os recentes protestos​ ocorridos no período da pandemia de Covid-19, nos quais entregadores de aplicativos reivindicavam melhorias para a classe, consideramos nos aprofundar no tema durante o projeto.

Em uma pesquisa conduzida pela Revista Jurídica Trabalho e Desenvolvimento Humano constatou-se que durante a pandemia, 62% dos trabalhadores estavam trabalhando mais do que 9 horas ao dia com 51,9% trabalhando 7 dias por semana.

Desafio: Como podemos ajudar os entregadores de aplicativos que estão insatisfeitos com o atual cenário que as plataformas de delivery proporcionam?

Tomando por base as principais reivindicações das manifestações, tínhamos como expectativa inicial o desenvolvimento de uma solução que trouxesse maior estabilidade para o trabalho dos entregadores — algo que provou ser mais complexo do que imaginávamos.

A seguir, a matriz onde levantamos as certezas, dúvidas e hipóteses que tínhamos ao iniciar o projeto (que depois foi complementada pelos insumos das pesquisas de mesa):

Material disponível sobre o tema é o que não falta. Desde matérias em diversos portais de notícia, pesquisas, vídeos feitos pelos próprios entregadores, até documentários. A maioria traz a discussão da precarização do trabalho, uberização e a situação estressada pela pandemia que culminou nos protestos.

Um deles é o documentário Vidas Entregues curta-metragem. O tema é sobre os entregadores de aplicativos de comida (iFood, Rappi, Uber) que trabalham de bicicleta:

Levantadas os dados em uma pesquisa secundária e construída a Matriz CSD, prosseguimos a fase de pesquisa/descoberta entrevistando 8 entregadores que nos ajudaram a entender os problemas reais desse contexto, como:

• Imprevisibilidade de renda.

“Quando o movimento está bom, a gente aproveita e faz até 16h horas, pra garantir, porque a gente não sabe se amanhã vai estar bom de novo.”

• Ausência de suporte dos aplicativos (mesmo quando são desligados da plataforma sem nenhuma razão clara).
• Tempo de espera no restaurante até sair um pedido e depois no cliente até virem buscar.
• Falta de qualidade de vida por ficarem muito tempo na rua e consequentemente pouco com a família
• Não terem pontos de apoio.

“Os aplicativos deviam ter um ponto de apoio pra nós, porque a gente fica na rua, não tem banheiro, não tem um lugar pra parar e esperar os pedidos… tinha que ter um apoio pra gente conseguir beber água, ter uma mesa pra almoçar. A gente senta na calçada pra poder comer. Até um lugar pra carregar o celular é difícil.”

Registro das entrevistas feitas com os entregadores:

Em seguida, falamos com 4 restaurantes (donos e gerentes). Fica claro que a maior insatisfação é o valor das taxas cobradas pelos aplicativos, que podem chegar até 30% do valor do pedido. Porém, apesar desse descontentamento, continuam nos aplicativos pois se não estiverem, o número de pedidos cai drasticamente.

“O alcance do ifood é melhor, ficamos meio refém deles.”

Também apareceram questões relacionadas à falta de transparência na comunicação das plataformas, ao descasamento entre o pedido estar pronto para sair e o horário que o entregador chega (seja antes ou depois) e ao extravio de pedidos (o que gera uma certa desconfiança na relação entre restaurante e entregador).

Aqui mostramos todos os problemas encontrados (para entregadores, em vermelho, e restaurantes em verde):

Persona: Marcos — Homem de 32 anos, classe C/D e única renda da família

Após as entrevistas pudemos traçar o perfil e a jornada do nosso usuário, o entregador.

“É preciso aproveitar as oportunidades que aparecem para conquistar o que desejo para mim e minha família”

Desde que perdeu o emprego há 8 meses, Marcos encontrou nos aplicativos uma forma de manter o sustento de casa. Apesar da sua jornada ser flexível, normalmente cumpre a mesma rotina todos os dias: acorda por volta das 7 horas e toma seu café da manhã, momento que compartilha da companhia de sua esposa e filho.

Por volta das 9 horas sai do Grajaú em direção à Interlargos, percurso que demora aproximadamente 30 minutos. Após percorrer uma distância de aproximadamente 13 quilômetros, se posiciona em pontos estratégicos como o shopping, postos de gasolina ou o mercado que fica na região.

Geralmente, por volta das 11 horas começam a chegar os primeiros pedidos. Já os últimos, não tem muita previsão, pois só volta pra casa quando consegue bater a sua meta diária, que é em torno de R$150,00 a R$200,00. Para atingir essa meta, trabalha cerca de 12 horas por dia, porém se perceber que o dia está rendendo, vai ficando mais tempo na rua:

Como “tempo é dinheiro”, sente-se angustiado quando fica ocioso, coisa que acontece com certa frequência. Seja esperando os pedidos chegarem, os pratos serem preparados ou os clientes o receberem. Esses tempos perdidos significam mais tempo na rua e menos tempo com a família.

Apesar de existirem essas pausas, Marcos não consegue conciliá-los com momentos em que possa descansar e se preparar para as próximas entregas, seja esticando as pernas, se alimentando ou até mesmo carregando seu celular. Para isso, conta apenas com a boa vontade das pessoas que trabalham nos restaurantes.

Ao mesmo tempo que Marcos gosta de trabalhar de forma autônoma, por se sentir livre, gostaria de ter algum apoio das plataformas e dos restaurantes, afinal, sente que o trabalho pesado é ele quem está fazendo.

Mapeamos toda a jornada do entregador durante um dia de trabalho, com o objetivo de ajudar a entender onde propostas de solução entrariam:

Analisando todos os resultados, propusemos uma solução que fosse viável das plataformas considerarem e que atendesse tanto os entregadores quanto os restaurantes, um ​programa de pontos de apoio.

Nesse canvas "Product Vision Board" damos a visão do que estamos tentando propor como solução para alguns dos problemas identificados:

A ideia é que as plataformas criassem um programa onde restaurantes poderiam se cadastrar como pontos de apoio parceiros, inserindo os benefícios que podem e querem oferecer, como água, banheiro, comida, espaço para carregar o celular, etc. Em troca, esses estabelecimentos receberiam benefícios, como redução do percentual no valor das taxas de pedido, ou períodos com valores de entrega reduzidos.

Para o restaurante, além dos benefícios monetários, a proposta também visa a construção de um melhor relacionamento com os entregadores, já que ao solicitarem os benefícios, seria exibido seu perfil para o atendente.

Do lado dos entregadores o benefício é evidente. Não só para os momentos entre corridas, mas também quando precisam esperar o pedido ficar pronto, tendo um espaço mais bem preparado para recebê-los.

Por fim, para as plataformas, acreditamos que seria uma solução com alto potencial de deixar restaurantes e entregadores mais satisfeitos, aumentando o NPS (notas de avaliação da plataforma) e consequentemente com ambos mais satisfeitos, os clientes finais teriam uma experiência melhor — todos ganham.

Abaixo listamos todos os benefícios mapeados para todas as pontas envolvidas:

Trabalhamos então em um protótipo de como poderia se materializar a solução, na perspectiva do entregador:

Se você trabalha para uma plataforma de delivery e tiver interesse em conversar conosco para trocarmos os aprendizados que tivemos, estamos super abertos! É só entrar em contato através do meu LinkedIn.

Aprendizados

• Tem muita coisa que acontece por trás das cortinas após um simples toque para finalizar um pedido de comida em um aplicativo de delivery.
• Conhecer a rotina de pessoas que fazem o serviço de entrega nos ajudou a valorizar ainda mais esse trabalho precarizado que está cada vez mais presente nos dias atuais.
• Como a desatenção com uma ou mais pontas de uma cadeia pode afetar todo o resto da mesma.
• E por fim, como na busca por introdução de novos serviços em nossas vidas, empresas não podem deixar de olhar as necessidades mais básicas dos envolvidos.

Referências e materiais indicados

• Documentários: Documentários sobre trabalho em plataformas
• Artigo: Estudo de UX para melhorar a qualidade de trabalho das diaristas brasileiras
• Matéria: Documentário discute a precarização pós reforma
• Matéria: GREG NEWS | DELIVERY
• Pesquisa: Condições de trabalho de entregadores via plataforma digital durante a Covid-19
• Matéria: Conheça os desafios de um entregador em época de pandemia
• Documentário: GIG — A Uberização do Trabalho (Trailer)
• Documentário: VIDAS ENTREGUES

Um pedido de melhores condições de trabalho was originally published in Somos Tera on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.