It’s not every day that a CEO of one of the most recognizable companies will ask its frontline employees and customers for direct feedback.
But last week, Lyft CEO David Risher did just that. The ride hailing company began its annual hackathon this month, and Risher took to LinkedIn to ask drivers and riders about what they need from Lyft.
“What Lyft is doing is smart, they’re giving people, frontline people, the drivers, permission to and a process to redefine experiences, instead of just complaining about it after the fact,” Michael Hinshaw, president of McorpCX, said. “They’re doing it with them, rather than to them.”
Lyft isn’t the only company to focus on co-creation, according to Hinshaw. But it is promoting it in a way that other companies would do well to follow.
“Lyft's hackathon gives team members the opportunity to address customer pain points, ideate on new possibilities outside of existing roadmaps, and learn new skills to better serve customers,” Bala Muthiah, Lyft’s director of engineering, told CX Dive in an email. “It's employee-driven, meaning ideas come from people closest to the products and we have award categories that are designed to channel that energy toward business-critical outcomes.”
The key to co-creation is about identifying the greatest pain points that executives might not necessarily be aware of and bring together a diverse team to find solutions to the problems that will have the greatest impact to the driver or rider.
“When customers and employees help design these things — whether it's a service, tool or process — adoption and satisfaction are higher on an ongoing basis because it was based around the wants and needs of the people,” Hinshaw said.
Lyft’s hackathon results speak for themselves, according to Muthiah. Hackathons have led to customer-facing features such as its pet mode, which allows riders to bring along their pets; Lyft Silver, a version of the app designed for older riders; and, Lyft Teen, a version of the app that helps parents set up and track rides for their teenagers.
That’s not to mention features for its driver, such as Restroom Finder.
“Some features get their start there entirely and are born from a friction log or an employee idea that wouldn't have surfaced on a traditional roadmap,” Muthiah said. “Pet Mode, Restroom Finder, and the Driver Accomplishment Letter are examples of that. Someone noticed a real problem, used the hackathon to build a solution, and it made it to market.”
Lyft Silver and Lyft Teen had already been in the works, but the hackathon gave teams dedicated time to prototype and test solutions, according to Muthiah. Two different ideas to support drivers that arose from a hackathon in 2024 were executed and are currently pending patent protection.
Key to its success is the intentional structure of the hackathons. “Projects are evaluated against business-critical award categories and the strongest ideas are fed directly into roadmap and planning cycles,” Muthiah said. “Executive leadership across the company serves as judges, which signals how seriously Lyft takes the outcomes.”
While many of these are customer experience solutions, they aren’t always led — and shouldn’t always be led — by the CX team. Key to co-creation is the diverse set of eyes working to solve a problem.
This year, Yuko Yamazaki, VP and head of driver, and Muthiah are the leads for Lyft’s hackathon. Each hackathon is composed of an executive sponsor, a core working group and representatives from engineering, design, data science, communications, central functions, workplace operations, and an employee business partner lead. Team size can vary from one person to eight people.
“By bringing people in across the organization, ideas can go from pain points to prototypes,” Hinshaw said. “It’s the human-centeredness of it. It’s looking at the problem from a completely new lens.”
It’s also important that it is led and championed by someone who can turn the solution into a real-life product or experience.
“Anyone who has the authority and interest in solving a problem is the right person to lead it,” Hinshaw said. “That narrows the aperture of who can lead it pretty rapidly.”
