Symetra

Symetra

Symetra

Designing Symetra's

Designing Symetra's

Designing Symetra's

Digital Customer Experience

Digital Customer Experience

Digital Customer Experience

UI Design

UX Research

Consulting

UI Design

UX Research

Consulting

UI Design

UX Research

Consulting

Challenge

Symetra's customer experience was nearly completely analog, with everything from statements to billing, and even payments, being handled on paper. They wanted to create a digital customer experience where customers could handle all of their needs.

Target Audience

Their target audience were working professionals ages 45 and up, with a household income of $100k-$150k.

My Role & Responsibilities

As a UX Designer on the team, I wore a lot of hats. My responsibilities included:


  • Creating and maintaining the design library

  • Creating wireframes, mockups, and prototypes

  • Usability testing

  • Education and training

  • Writing user stories and acceptance criteria

  • Sprint Planning


It was the largest team I have ever been a part of. The team consisted of Business Analysts (3), Product Owners (4), Developers (9), and Designers (5), all working together to create the product.

Creating & Maintaining a UI Library

This was a collaborative effort between two product teams: Customer and Partner. The design library needed to be utilized by both teams.


While the responsibility was shared amongst the design team, I contributed specifically to the following sections of the design library:


Education & Training

While the designers from Fresh Consulting were well-versed in using Figma, Symetra's designers were not. In the beginning, there were times where I would need to recreate work that the Symetra designers created to avoid accumulating design debt. This lead to the creation of a couple trainings with the intention of removing duplicating efforts altogether.


Below you'll find links to the Figma working files. An active learning experience is the best way to learn, so these trainings were designed around "Discussion" and "Practice Doing".



Organizing The Work

We initially had all of the features contained in a single Figma file. This quickly became unwieldy as each feature progressed and grew. Stakeholders, Business Analysts, Product Owners, and Developers had difficulty finding the designs they needed.The solution for this was to separate each feature into it's own Figma file using the specific page structure outlined in the page below.



Handing Off The Designs

Design and development teams moved in tandem, working on the same features during the same sprints. This lead to confusion as to what was ready for developers to build out, and frustration when something they built changed unexpectedly. To combat this, I wrote a handoff guide to ensure everyone new the status of any given feature.


Wireframes & Mockups

Each of the following links will open to an external Notion page:



I've included a high-level overview of the work below this section.

Challenge

Symetra's customer experience was nearly completely analog, with everything from statements to billing, and even payments, being handled on paper. They wanted to create a digital customer experience where customers could handle all of their needs.

Target Audience

Their target audience were working professionals ages 45 and up, with a household income of $100k-$150k.

My Role & Responsibilities

As a UX Designer on the team, I wore a lot of hats. My responsibilities included:


  • Creating and maintaining the design library

  • Creating wireframes, mockups, and prototypes

  • Usability testing

  • Education and training

  • Writing user stories and acceptance criteria

  • Sprint Planning


It was the largest team I have ever been a part of. The team consisted of Business Analysts (3), Product Owners (4), Developers (9), and Designers (5), all working together to create the product.

Creating & Maintaining a UI Library

This was a collaborative effort between two product teams: Customer and Partner. The design library needed to be utilized by both teams.


While the responsibility was shared amongst the design team, I contributed specifically to the following sections of the design library:


Education & Training

While the designers from Fresh Consulting were well-versed in using Figma, Symetra's designers were not. In the beginning, there were times where I would need to recreate work that the Symetra designers created to avoid accumulating design debt. This lead to the creation of a couple trainings with the intention of removing duplicating efforts altogether.


Below you'll find links to the Figma working files. An active learning experience is the best way to learn, so these trainings were designed around "Discussion" and "Practice Doing".



Organizing The Work

We initially had all of the features contained in a single Figma file. This quickly became unwieldy as each feature progressed and grew. Stakeholders, Business Analysts, Product Owners, and Developers had difficulty finding the designs they needed.The solution for this was to separate each feature into it's own Figma file using the specific page structure outlined in the page below.



Handing Off The Designs

Design and development teams moved in tandem, working on the same features during the same sprints. This lead to confusion as to what was ready for developers to build out, and frustration when something they built changed unexpectedly. To combat this, I wrote a handoff guide to ensure everyone new the status of any given feature.


Wireframes & Mockups

Each of the following links will open to an external Notion page:



I've included a high-level overview of the work below this section.

Challenge

Symetra's customer experience was nearly completely analog, with everything from statements to billing, and even payments, being handled on paper. They wanted to create a digital customer experience where customers could handle all of their needs.

Target Audience

Their target audience were working professionals ages 45 and up, with a household income of $100k-$150k.

My Role & Responsibilities

As a UX Designer on the team, I wore a lot of hats. My responsibilities included:


  • Creating and maintaining the design library

  • Creating wireframes, mockups, and prototypes

  • Usability testing

  • Education and training

  • Writing user stories and acceptance criteria

  • Sprint Planning


It was the largest team I have ever been a part of. The team consisted of Business Analysts (3), Product Owners (4), Developers (9), and Designers (5), all working together to create the product.

Creating & Maintaining a UI Library

This was a collaborative effort between two product teams: Customer and Partner. The design library needed to be utilized by both teams.


While the responsibility was shared amongst the design team, I contributed specifically to the following sections of the design library:


Education & Training

While the designers from Fresh Consulting were well-versed in using Figma, Symetra's designers were not. In the beginning, there were times where I would need to recreate work that the Symetra designers created to avoid accumulating design debt. This lead to the creation of a couple trainings with the intention of removing duplicating efforts altogether.


Below you'll find links to the Figma working files. An active learning experience is the best way to learn, so these trainings were designed around "Discussion" and "Practice Doing".



Organizing The Work

We initially had all of the features contained in a single Figma file. This quickly became unwieldy as each feature progressed and grew. Stakeholders, Business Analysts, Product Owners, and Developers had difficulty finding the designs they needed.The solution for this was to separate each feature into it's own Figma file using the specific page structure outlined in the page below.



Handing Off The Designs

Design and development teams moved in tandem, working on the same features during the same sprints. This lead to confusion as to what was ready for developers to build out, and frustration when something they built changed unexpectedly. To combat this, I wrote a handoff guide to ensure everyone new the status of any given feature.


Wireframes & Mockups

Each of the following links will open to an external Notion page:



I've included a high-level overview of the work below this section.

Mobile Screens

Usability Testing with Usertesting.com

Both Symetra and Fresh Consulting designers had no prior experience with UserTesting.com, so I created a workflow for the team to follow.


Testing Policy Details v2

I tested the “Policy Details” page for both Desktop and Mobile sizes. See the outcomes below:


Usability Testing with Usertesting.com

Both Symetra and Fresh Consulting designers had no prior experience with UserTesting.com, so I created a workflow for the team to follow.


Testing Policy Details v2

I tested the “Policy Details” page for both Desktop and Mobile sizes. See the outcomes below:


Usability Testing with Usertesting.com

Both Symetra and Fresh Consulting designers had no prior experience with UserTesting.com, so I created a workflow for the team to follow.


Testing Policy Details v2

I tested the “Policy Details” page for both Desktop and Mobile sizes. See the outcomes below:


Conclusion

Closing Thoughts

Symetra's Digital Customer Experience launched in December of 2020. I learned how much I enjoyed working in a product design environment. Often times in a traditional agency setting, you'll create something and never touch it again. There's something to be said about designing something and continually iterating on it to make it better.

Services

UI Design

UX Research

Consulting

Tools

Figma

Usertesting.com

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