Designing a text-based AI scheduling assistant chatbot for a business environment. : A case study of a mobile-based AI scheduling assistant app.

Abstract: Scheduling a time to meet can be time-consuming, especially when coordinating with email. It could be challenging for business people when each participant is required to email back and forth to propose their availability, matching each other's time availability, and finding a suitable location to meet. It is even worse when participants must reschedule the entire meeting.   This thesis aims to design and develop an artificial intelligence (AI) scheduling assistant chatbot mobile app that could assist people in scheduling meetings efficiently in the business environment. The research process involves two rounds of design iterations. In the first design iteration, the goal was to explore and test the possible ways to design the chatbot. In the second design iteration, the goal was to learn from the first iteration and improve the design to fulfil the users' needs. The results implied five options for designers to consider when designing an AI assistant chatbot for the business environment. The considerations include the (1) maturity of natural language processing, (2) instructions to new users, (3) feedback provided by the AI assistant, (4) effort of typing messages, and (5) personality of the AI assistant.