from mechanism
to momentum
embedded design processes that unified fragmented experiences and drove a 46% increase in learner engagement.
this case study has been condensed with all confidential information removed. If you would like to learn more about this design and process, please contact me.
overview
By this point, the organization had a research practice, a measurement framework, and a continuous evidence pipeline. What it didn't have was a way of working that could translate all of that into consistent, high-quality product delivery across a complex platform.
AWS Skill Builder served 25 million customers across four distinct product surfaces: a B2C learning experience, a B2B administration console for training managers, a payment and subscription system, and an internal learning management system where all training content was created and managed. The redesign spanned 30 pages across these four surfaces, each serving different user types — learners discovering and consuming content, external admins managing teams and compliance, internal content authors building curriculum, and the shared platform chrome tying them together.
Each surface had different users, different engineering teams, and different product priorities. Design operated from a central pool, handing off work after decisions had already been shaped. Engineering and product moved on their own timelines. Trust was low, shared visibility was limited, and the platform had grown organically into inconsistent patterns with no design system, no accessibility standards, and fragmented discoverability.
The challenge wasn't just redesigning the platform. It was building a way of working that could span all four product contexts and hold up after the redesign was done. I led a team of 10 across all product surfaces, designing alongside the team while my designers owned surface-level work within each product area. My direct contributions were the operating model itself: the embedded team structure, tiered reviews, rapid research mechanism, design strategy, and accessibility standards, along with the cross-functional relationships with engineering and product leadership that made the structural changes possible.
problem
Three structural gaps kept the platform fragmented and the teams building it disconnected from each other.
Disconnected functions.
Design, product, and engineering operated on separate timelines. Designers were brought in at handoff, not problem definition. Product made roadmap decisions without adequate research input. Engineering built against specs that didn't reflect the full design intent. The result was slow delivery, rework, and a pattern where each function optimized for its own workflow rather than the shared outcome.
No unifying system.
The platform had no component library, no shared templates, no UX writing standards, and no systematic approach to accessibility. Each product surface had developed its own patterns. A user moving between the B2C experience and the admin console encountered different navigation models, different terminology, and different interaction patterns. The inconsistency wasn't just a design problem. It was a trust problem for customers operating across surfaces.
Testing at a new scale.
The redesign's scope and timeline were unlike anything the existing research process had been built for. Getting 30 pages across four product surfaces in front of customers, and getting usable feedback back fast enough to act on, required a fundamentally different cadence. The existing approach couldn't validate at the volume or speed the work demanded.
solution
The work started with how the team was organized, then built outward to systems and cadence.
Embedded partnerships.
I restructured the team model, moving designers out of a central pool and embedding them directly within engineering pods. Each designer was paired with a product manager and engineering lead, forming a trio that worked together from problem definition through delivery. Design was in the room when constraints were identified and tradeoffs were made, not interpreting them secondhand from a spec.
Tiered decision-making.
Not every design decision needs the same level of review. I created a tiered process that distinguished high-stakes decisions requiring full cross-functional alignment from decisions designers could make independently. This removed bottlenecks without removing accountability. Designers moved faster on routine work while critical decisions got the scrutiny they needed.
With the team restructured around shared ownership, the systems and cadence that followed had somewhere to land.
rapid research + a scalable system.
I built a 3-week sprint mechanism for continuous testing, which increased testing by 143% and reduce cycle time by 57%. Alongside it, we built a design system that worked across all four product contexts: a component library, 11 reusable templates, and UX writing standards spanning component sets, components, and variants , documented for handoff and built to WCAG 2.1 compliance.
results
Six years of operation. Measured at every stage.
46%
increase in engagement
20%
faster design delivery
143%
more testing
The platform redesign shipped six weeks ahead of schedule. But the real result was that the mechanisms outlasted the project. The embedded trio model, the tiered review process, and the rapid experimentation cadence were formalized as the operating model, not adopted for a single initiative. The design system continues to govern how new features are built across all four product surfaces, and the research mechanism continues to generate evidence that shapes what gets built next.
30.5%
improvement in navigation
100%
WCAG 2.1 compliance
what was learned
The hardest part wasn't building the system. It was renegotiating how design, product, and engineering worked together after years of operating on separate timelines.
Embedding designers into engineering pods meant some teams had to give up control they were used to having, and some designers had to give up the safety of working at a remove from delivery pressure. That friction was real, and it didn't resolve on day one.
What made it work was proving value early through the rapid testing mechanism. Once teams saw evidence-backed decisions ship faster, the structural change stopped feeling like a loss of autonomy and started feeling like the way the work should have always been done.
what this unlocked
This is where the four chapters connect. The research practice created access to customers. The evidence pipeline created continuous signal. The measurement framework turned shared signals into a language for quality. And the team mechanisms created the organizational muscle to act on all of it, consistently, across products, at pace.
What started as infrastructure became culture. Not because it was mandated, but because it worked, and because the teams who used it shipped better products, faster, with evidence they trusted. That's the version of institutional change that holds.