Becoming a design leader for a SaaS company
Less than a year after I joined Facilisgroup, I was promoted to Lead UI/UX Designer, a shift that gave me the opportunity to guide and support a small team of designers while continuing to contribute to the development of Commercio Stores (read my case study). For two years, I helped build the team’s culture, introduced process improvements, and advocated across departments for accessibility and research-driven design.
The organizational structure of the product department, highlighting where my team and I fit in. As Lead UI/UX Designer, I collaborated closely with two product managers (one overseeing two products), along with the product owner and technical writer assigned to my original product team.
Rituals, tools, and vision
Since most designers were working on a different product, I focused on creating shared rituals and spaces to help us stay connected and learn from each other:
Our recurring monthly activities. Since Wednesdays were the busiest for everyone, I scheduled meetings around them. Weekly reviews (30–60 minutes) were held Monday afternoons when at least one team member was ready for feedback. Stand-ups (15 minutes) took place on Tuesday and Thursday mornings, with 1:1s (30 minutes) every Tuesday afternoon. Show and tell sessions (30 minutes) ran twice a month on Thursday afternoons, hosted in rotation by each team member.
Additionally, I started each week by sharing a quote sourced by team members, which sparked discussions and inspired us to do our best work:
I also introduced tools and templates to help us work more efficiently and consistently. First, I adapted the Figma library I had built for Commercio Stores to be used by another product team. Second, I created a research starter kit to make it easier to plan, conduct, and share user research. Finally, I consolidated existing and new design documentation and research material.
As a manager, I helped each member define yearly goals, some contributing directly to product or business priorities, some to the growth of our team (see below), and others based on personal interests. I’m especially proud of securing funding that allowed each designer to complete a certification with the Norman Nielsen Group.
At the start of 2024, I ran a workshop with the team to identify areas of improvement and electing a few goals for the year.
Raising awareness and changing mindsets
Outside of the design team, I focused on raising awareness around accessibility and user research.
I made it a personal goal to bring more attention to accessibility in digital products, and wrote a dozen posts that I shared across internal channels. These were well-received by both colleagues and executives, and sparked conversations that helped shift how people across departments thought about inclusive design.
I also regularly advocated for user research throughout the design process. I wanted each designer to focus on solving the right problems, but also learn from users once they started to use a new feature. To do so, I encouraged them to use analytics tools and create targeted in-app surveys.
Takeaway
Through this experience, I learned how to support the people I wanted to see succeed. The common vision, processes and tools I introduced brought clarity and helped each team member spend their time and energy on what really mattered. One of the most meaningful pieces of feedback I received came from them: they felt genuinely heard and supported, something I believe is one of the most important thing to strive for as a leader.