Context
I recently joined an enterprise AI startup as their first product hire. The product had been running for a while without design support, which left it with inconsistent user flows and mounting UX debt (common in fast-moving startups). My challenge was to improve usability while keeping pace with rapid feature development. The stakes were high. Improving usability was critical to supporting growth.
Due to my NDA, I canât share details on the company, the product, or client outcomes. This article focuses only on my process, role, and takeaways. If youâd like to go deeper into how I approach product and design, I recommend reading this blog article. If you want to see more of my visual design craft, check out this case study.
Role Highlights
Customer interviews
Speaking directly with our users was an amazing opportunity to gather rich feedback that had a direct impact on the work I was doing.
In situations like this where customers already have existing workflows, Iâve found it best to go with an unstructured flow. So, after our introduction and understanding context, I just asked people to share their screen and walk me through their workflow. As they went through the "thinking out loud" excercise, we took note of what worked and what didn't. The feedback was invaluable in improving the product.
Workshops
Design is a powerful tool for alignment. During key product discussions, we needed to gather information from the entire team to make an informed decision on our future state. To bring the team together, I facilitated workshops using frameworks like Object-Oriented UX (re: object oriented UX) and customer journey mapping.
These sessions helped create a shared picture and highlight overlooked areas. Engineers, designers, and leadership all left with momentum, and the positive feedback reminded me just how powerful alignment work can be.
A shared design system
Our frontend was moving quickly. With a small design and engineering team shipping often, the product could have become inconsistent fast. To solve this, I partnered with the design team to build our design system. We built on an existing component library, expanding it with custom components and refined patterns to fit the teamâs needs. The system sped up design, gave us a scalable toolkit to work from and gave engineering a smoother path for development.
Key Takeaways
đ Building diagonally
Building great products, especially AI tools in today's age, means moving on two axes at once: solving todayâs user problems and exploring what tomorrow makes possible. In AI, the ceiling of what's possible keeps rising and customer expectations trail behind it. It's important to continuously research what's possible to anticipate and account for future customer pain points or opportunities.
âď¸ Flexible communication with engineering
Once the design system was in place, I realized that a polished design handoff wasnât always necessary. For smaller features, referencing design system components and sharing a quick sketch was enough to keep velocity high. There are multiple ways to communicate design intent effectively, and adapting the fidelity to the situation can help the team be more efficient.
đ§ Empathizing with business goals
Design direction needs to follow the business priorities. Understanding the why and why now behind feature decisions was essential, because it made me more effective at prioritization and framing tradeoffs. If youâd like to read more about how business and design strategy work together, I recommend reading this blog article.
Personal Reflection
Working here blurred the line between design and product management. I came in as a designer, but I left with a stronger sense of experimentation, momentum, and ownership. I learned how to balance âbetsâ versus âfeatures,â how to advocate for engineering time, and how to make decisions with business outcomes in mind, not just design craft.
The team itself encouraged experimentation. We loved trying new tools and new ways of working, and I had the unique experience of being on the buyer side for many of them. It gave me a small glimpse into B2B sales. It was eye-opening to see how vendor sales teams frame value, and it sparked a personal interest in working more closely with sales and customer support as a future âvoice of the customer.â
It reinforced how much I value roles where I can take ownership and create impact across functions. If that sounds like someone your team could use, Iâm open to roles starting January 2026 :)