Improving discoverability with a site redesign
ROLE
Product designer at Cisco
DURATION
March 2025 – October 2025
TEAM
Product designer
Content designer
UX researcher
HIGHLIGHTS
Product thinking + strategy
Information architecture
overview
Project TL;DR
Re-design the Devices site to increase feature discoverability and task health scores
Users visit Devices to manage their laptops, mobile phones, and anything else they use for work. However, 51% of users shared that they struggle to find what they need. My goal was to design a scalable solution that improves discoverability of features and task completion.
Some key screens post-redesign
Current state
Devices was hanging on by a thread
We knew something was broken, but we had to narrow things down. I started by combing through existing research and data to see the potential gaps and opportunities. From that analysis, I identified three main focus areas:
Discoverability
51% of users who struggle to complete tasks "can't find what they need."
The content and UI choices may not have been meeting our users' mental models.
Scalability
Our site was built quickly to satisfy stakeholder needs, and new features were added in like a patchwork quilt.
The structure of the site was limited and couldn't support all the feature requests we received.
Performance
Our task health score was 65%, partly due to bugs.
While trying to complete tasks, the site would often crash or time out, and users would be left at a dead end.
Our simple, text-heavy site (pre-redesign)
Solution
Transforming Devices into a scalable platform that meets employees' needs
This was a design-led project, starting from problem identification all the way through roadmap creation and execution. I crafted a three-pronged approach that set our baselines, kept us aligned, and helped meet our targets.
Discoverability
We needed to meet our users where they’re at - that means elevating popular tasks, revisiting our information architecture, and using a visual language that's inviting and intuitive.
Scalability
Devices has plans to grow. This restructuring needed to support future stakeholder requests and allow our design team to keep up.
Performance
A new UI is nothing without a good foundation. That's why I made site reliability a priority to reduce errors, UI defects, and load times.
The core goals and metrics from the product roadmap I created
approach
Pausing now to go faster later
I got buy-in from executive stakeholders to pause our regular feature work and allow us to focus on the core site. This was a tough sell, but our mantra was clear: it's now or never.
Presenting to stakeholders
Our product manager was on board and stayed closely aligned as we defined our vision for Devices. However, our stakeholders needed some convincing. I helped argue that with the restructuring of the site and the creation of patterns and templates, we could reduce design cycle times by 40%. That means new features at breakneck speed.
Getting it done
We knew what our core goals were, but we needed a system to help execute. Veering into design PO territory, I created a roadmap that helped convert things into Jira. This allowed us to translate our larger goals into features, epics, and stories.
This project is still under construction. Stay tuned for more!
