Product Design
1 year 7 month
Designed complex systems for highly specialised domains
My role
Set up the process and conducted exploratory research, complete redesign and solution validation for Enterprise API governance and observability platform
Helped to optimise user experience of HTTP client for VS code environment. Created a fully customisable user interface which can support specific IDE workflow requirements
Conducted exploratory research and concept work for modern API design tool which can help to manage the full API life-cycle, from product requirements to testing
Worked with various sources for design decisions, Amplitude, Hotjar, user and stakeholder interviews
Helped to build efficient and outcome-based design review and heuristic evaluation process
Contributed to design system and UI accessibility
Wore a PM hat by making research insights actionable, formalising them in job stories, prioritising and communicating to team. Acceptance testing
The outcomes
Fast adoption by over 290 000 users of VS code extension
Delivery of crucial features in time which allows to retain big clients
Redesign of the governance solution resulted in decrease of the support tickets and time customer-facing teams spent for onboarding new clients
Changes to backoffice with self-serve features sped up the work of support and customer success teams
Migrated whole product areas to proprietary design system
Helped to build an effective, user-centric product design team
Designed the process for exploratory research and validation
I used a simple framework to initiate design projects, with the mapped job stories as an outcome before diving into Figma.
I treat my design framework as an iterative product itself. The main goal is to get to sound arguments to make decision.
System design
After defining user goals and converting them into job stories, I designed consistent layouts for various page types within a given project (such as list and detail views). I also created shared patterns for navigation between related objects and pages, implemented search functionality, and provided contextual help.
Additionally, I established a clear taxonomy and utilised semantically correct components. The aim was to support natural ways of working, minimising surprises and fatigue for users.
Validated with hand-picked users
Using an interactive prototype and a set of tasks based on job stories, I conducted solution validation and iterative improvements.
Additionally throughout the process, I actively sought input from customer success managers, development team, and design team.
Established design principles and promoted user-centric design practices
Designing for developer interfaces is very different from designing for less tech-savvy audiences, you need to know when to sacrifice simplicity over additional functionality. How to balance smart defaults with customisability (the flow is less linear than for ex. in CRM), and create reliable and user-friendly documentation, which for complex applications is paramount.
To make a product ecosystem coherent we established “design for developers” principles that incorporated main UI paradigms and simplified decision making for us. I have learned how to effectively work with distributed teams from all over Europe, US and Israel. Successfully established and promoted user-centric practices in initially engineering-driven company.
Contact me if you want to learn more about my experience designing complex systems for highly specialised domains 👋
maksym.viushkin@gmail.com