“Design is the intent behind the outcome
- so be intentional”

Facilitating an ideation workshop at Reliance

Design Principles

Empathy

I like to build with the user in mind at all times. If I can empathize, then I can advocate for a solution that people actually need.

Mindfulness

Mindfulness and intentionality go hand in hand. At every step of the process, I am mindful that I’m still solving the right problem and ensure all design decisions are deliberate.

Experimentation

Design is testing. I think testing out designs and getting feedback is the most rewarding, validating and humbling part of design and I LIVE for it. Nothing gets my blood pumping like doing usability tests or seeing results of tests in the morning.

Aesthetics

I adore visual design. Creating high fidelity prototypes and designs is my happy place and brings me a lot of joy. I tend to express this love though building design systems.

Empathy

I like to build with the user in mind at all times. If I can empathize, then I can advocate for a solution that people actually need.

Mindfulness

Mindfulness and intentionality go hand in hand. At every step of the process, I am mindful that I’m still solving the right problem and ensure all design decisions are deliberate.

Experimentation

Aesthetics

I adore visual design. Creating high fidelity prototypes and designs is my happy place and brings me a lot of joy. I tend to express this love though building design systems

Design process is rarely linear and also is subject to the process the organisation follows as a whole. I have preferred a combination of Agile and lean UX. The nitty gritty method choice tends to differ but I still follow a general process for every project.

“Trust the process to find the best solution”

Design Process

Empathise

I usually try to follow a sprint structure and a user centered design process. It starts with empathising with our customers and engaging stakeholders from business, design, product and technical teams to understand what the problem, project scope, deliverables.

Understand the pain points

During this phase, I collect information, talk to people, and explore the problem space. I will also create user stories and understand why the product came to be the way it is. If user research isn't within the budget or allocated time, I'll try to conduct ad hoc guerilla interviews to avoid designing blindly.

Ideate over solutions

The one thing I stick on top of my ideation board is "UI is not the solution" and ideate the solutions or paths to ease the user journey. It's always helpful to keep a visual diagram of the journey handy to edit and make multiple versions of it. I usually keep the tech team and product team in the loop for this phase. This is the converging point to prioritise and decide on the path forward. I make sure that accessibility and usability are integral parts of the designs.

Design and Prototype

it's time to start sketching out how the users will interact with the interface- "The UI part". This is where I start to think about things like the overall layout, navigation, and specific elements on each page. Here we will see the information architecture we decided on take a detailed route and see it come alive as prototypes.

Test, iterate and test again - Deliver

In this final phase, I will test the prototype with users. Sometimes it will be a quick guerilla test, while other times it may be a full-fledged usability test session. The test results will help us understand what needs to be changed and fixed. The deliverables are then developed and made live for further testing and iteration