This project is under NDA.
What I did
- worked closely with the founder on defining product visions
- mapped out product flows
- sketched wireframes
- designed high-fidelity prototypes
- crafted interactions
- created the initial design system
- worked with developers on a daily basis to ensure smooth engineering handoff
What I learned
- How to collaborate with cross-disciplinary teams. As the first and only designer in the company, I worked with PM, engineerings, QA, and Customer Success teams every day.
- How to collaborate with cross-time zone teams. Every day in my west coast office, I was working with colleagues based in the east coast and India.
- How to work efficiently with colleagues, remotely. This COVID-19 phenomenon is not something new to me because it was an everyday situation to me. Since I worked at the headquarter (Palo Alto, CA) while most colleagues were based in India, the majority of my work collaborations were handled remotely. It was challenging, but I managed it well.
- How to communicate effectively with colleagues, remotely. I started to realize the importance of effective communication since I was at school, and intentionally practice this soft skill through class projects and campus activities. At Isima, I was able to practice it daily, in remote work cases.
- How to organize and prioritize multiple work tasks, and deliver multiple deliverables with great quality under time pressure.
- How to handle urgent work under tight time pressure. This was out of my comfort zone at first, but quickly became something I was actually excited to deal with because I could see my growth.
- How to effectively get internal buy-in. This was a must-have skill for me, as most of my colleagues were engineers. It was challenging at first, but it quickly became a joyful experience because it made my voice heard as a designer and effectively facilitated collaboration.
- How to keep updated with design trends. As the only designer in the company, it was crucial for me to self-taught, keep gaining professional product design knowledge and skills.
- How to grow and learn in a fast-moving startup environment. I communicate blockers and exchange feedbacks on specific work in the daily standups and the weekly retrospective meetings.
- Design sprint process and methodologies. I led multiple design sprint sessions, presenting to the team and iterating my designs based on feedback.
- Agile development process and methodologies. When handing off my deliverables to engineers, I familiarize myself with the agile process to better facilitate engineering effort.
- Domain knowledges of BI (business intelligence), AI, and ML.
%401x.svg)
%401x.svg)
%401x%20(1).svg)
%401x.svg)
