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Turning a complex, multi-stakeholder, multi-stage process into a centralized, intelligent, and efficient operating system.
My Role
Product Designer
led the UX/UI, information architecture, flows, interaction design, and high-fidelity prototyping.
Team
Product Lead, Product Manager, UX/UI Designer, Lead Developer,three software engineers, and four representatives from the client organization.
A complex, multi-team process was run across WhatsApp groups, email threads and a shared Excel file, with no defined stages and no way to see the bigger picture.
Turn a complex investigation process into one clear, centralized workflow for managing, tracking, and moving each investigation forward from start to finish.
Background
What We Started With...
A small unit reporting directly to the senior leadership, pulling OSINT, intelligence and operational material into an investigation, one factual account of what happened.That investigation had to hold up under external legal scrutiny.
No system to redesign. Just people, handing work to each other. So I mapped the handoffs ↓
The RESEARCH challenge
Limited access
We couldn't see the data or the work we were designing for.
Many roles, many stages
Sub-stages ran in parallel — the process rarely followed one path.
The central user was leaving
Everything ran through one key person who was about to leave.
Previous tools hadn't held
Earlier solutions failed to fit the way people actually worked.
They speak their own language
Each stage had its own terms and shorthand.
It had to scale to other teams later
The model would need to become modular for additional teams.
The RESEARCH Process
Research was an important part of this project, so we approached it from several angles: one-on-one stakeholder sessions, a full-day kick-off with every role in the process, a working session that walked one complete investigation end to end, review of completed assessments and existing tools. We mapped the core personas around their goals, needs and permissions. tested 2–3 UI directions with users on language, sequence, information load and edge cases.
Key insights
01
Nobody could say where anything stood
Bottlenecks stayed invisible until someone chased them down.
Time-stamped statuses, with alerts when something stalls.
02
An event and an investigation are not the same
Same record, entirely different actions — one is triaged, the other is worked.
Two dedicated pages, each with its own table and actions.
03
The process isn't linear
Stages run in parallel at different speeds.
Stages and tasks that stay editable, tracked by a non-linear progress bar.
04
It stalled at the handoffs
Information passed between roles through disconnected tools and files.
One shared workspace that keeps the investigation moving.
05
Previous tools had eroded trust
Past solutions didn't fit the real workflow and often worked in isolation.
The MVP had to fit existing work first — and connect what was already there.
06
Existing tools had to come before advanced features
Users first needed the tools they already relied on to work properly in one place.
Cover the essential workflow first — then introduce advanced features, automation and AI.
One process seen from two distances — one tracks the whole organization, the other drives a single investigation from start to finish.
Operations
Managing the organizational picture
Responsible for prioritization, team assignment, and tracking investigations across the organization.
Workload
Oversight of thousands of events in parallel.
Permissions
Unrestricted: sees every investigation across the organization.
Needs to know
What needs attention now? · Where is work stuck? · Who owns what?
MVP response
A high-level view of status, time, teams, and exceptions.
Investigation Lead
Managing the individual investigations
Responsible for gathering materials, managing tasks, writing, and approvals through final delivery.
Workload
Managing 5–10 investigations in parallel.
Permissions
Restricted — only the investigations and material assigned to them.
Needs to know
What information already exists? · What is still missing? · What's the next step?
MVP response
One focused workspace for materials, tasks, progress, and approvals.
Design
Events Table
Thousands of triaged events in one view, split into all events and active investigations. Clickable dashboards, filters, and a status chip with days elapsed make bottlenecks visible. Each row expands to quickly view and edit its data.
Investigation Workspace
A single investigation with details and a progress bar that expands into non-linear tasks. Each task opens with its own tailored features. Tabs hold tasks and documents, event details, queries, and the approval round.
Report Editor
A structured editor that opens with the event's metadata and the report's fixed chapter list. Rich text, autosave, and export to PDF or to the knowledge base.
