Context

SMS Assist (acquired by Lessen) connects thousands of service affiliates to nationwide property management firms. At the heart of the platform was the Affiliate Dashboard, a daily control center for managing high volumes of maintenance work orders.

When I joined, adoption was low and user frustration high. The dashboard meant to streamline task workflows was itself a source of friction, resulting in delays, lost revenue, and elevated support tickets. I was brought in as UX Architect to lead a full redesign of the Action Center experience and align it with the company’s operational KPIs.

My Role

• Title: UX Architect (Lead Designer)

• Team: PM, Engineers, Intern Designer

• Timeline: April – November 2022

• Methods: Journey Mapping, Systems Thinking, High-Fidelity Prototypes, Usability Testing

• Tools: Figma, Sketch, Jira, Miro, Loom

The Problem

Affiliate managers were responsible for managing 50–100+ open work orders daily. But instead of enabling action, the dashboard was:

• Overloaded with filters and content

• Cluttered and unintuitive, increasing decision fatigue

• Hiding core features like “Snooze,” “Reschedule,” or “Assign Tech”

• Forcing users to call support to get things done

The result: low task completion rates, delayed service dispatches, and high operational cost from manual intervention.

Research Strategy

Instead of jumping into redesign, I zoomed out to understand the full operational system. I collaborated with product and analytics to prioritize root causes, then conducted the following:

• 7 stakeholder interviews across dispatch, affiliate management, and quoting

• Workflow audits of real-time user sessions (with screen recordings)

• Journey Maps

Key Insights

🧠 “The issue wasn’t just UI clutter, it was misaligned mental models and a lack of task prioritization logic in the system.”

Challenges:

• fragmented navigation

• hidden core actions

• excessive filtering

• no prioritization

• support reliance

Design Strategy & Iteration Process

I framed our goal as “Enabling confident, rapid decision-making at scale.”

My approach focused on clarity, prioritization, and discoverability.

Staff-Level Influence Through Systems Thinking

I didn’t just redesign screens, I redesigned the way affiliate managers think and work within the platform. Every decision was anchored in how to:

• Reduce operational drag

• Improve cognitive throughput

• Align UX with business KPIs

Cross-Functional Execution

• Worked closely with product to define success metrics

• Collaborated with engineering for technical feasibility and handoff

• Partnered with support to ensure post-launch readiness

“This wasn’t a UI facelift. It was a product rethink rooted in behavioral data, user psychology, and business alignment.”