The heuristics, personas, and flows behind the work — method made visible

Problem

The platform's sign-up flow had been designed around the mental model of the engineers who built the underlying product, not the people actually signing up for it — a gap no one had measured, only suspected.

Approach

I ran a full research arc to make the gap visible: a heuristic evaluation of the existing flow, personas validated against real users rather than assumed, and two rounds of usability testing to check the redesign against people who weren't in the room when it was built.

Outcome

A sign-up flow rebuilt around evidence of how people actually approached it, and a documented method — heuristics, personas, flows — the team could reuse on the next redesign.