Key takeaways

As the first UX designer on the team and in the company, my initial responsibility on this project was twofold: (1) to build a user-friendly tax application and (2) to elevate the UX maturity of the organization.

As the company had no prior experience working with a UX designer, in the initial phase, I had to work with what was given, including working on a timeline that gave no space for any UX activities. In order to secure UX resources, I had to convince the value of UX to the upper management; and to do this, I needed evidence to prove its value; and to collect evidence, I had to conduct UX activities and create an impact; and to be able to take actions, I had to gain support from the project members and clients. Thus, my first few months in the project was focused on establishing a trusting relationship with the stakeholders. However, once the trust was established, I was able to propose and initiate various UX activities that ultimately helped enhance the user experience of the application.

Here are some of the biggest takeaways from the project:

Proactively manage expectation

I learned that the quickest way to earning someone’s trust is when you understand what their expectations are (of you, the team, the project etc.) and proactively working to meet them. Sometimes this can be frightening because it puts you in a position to fulfill what was promised. However, this doesn’t mean there is no room for negotiation. In fact, I learned that understanding client expectation means I can openly make alternative suggestions or even communicate my failures and my intentions.

Use the meeting time to co-create with users

I have started treating the client design review meeting as an informal co-creation session, rather than a formal design presentation. For instance, if new ideas are exchanged in a meeting, I learned that it’s best to quickly create a rough mockup on the spot so that the participants can quickly make an assessment. I have also learned that it is helpful to keep all of my design iterations for a client meeting just so that if they ever address an idea that I have already considered and tried, I can present it for discussion. The more I started setting up a meeting this way, the more ideas and suggestions were provided by the participants.

Articulate tradeoffs in decision-making

It was important that I took on a role as a product owner when making multiple idea proposals to a client, so that I could effectively communicate the pros and cons of each idea, including the development cost, feasibility, complexity, and usability. This meant that I was also responsible for making the assessment with relevant members before the client meeting so that I could make a recommendation on behalf of my team.