Complexity → Simplicity
I spot when a system is overcomplicated and hurting production cost, user experience, or both. Then I propose concrete ways to simplify it.
Example: Unified Client Application for Microsoft Dynamics 365
There were 4 different design languages and 10+ variations of every control, which then became 1 style and one variation for 3 form factors.
How it started:
I asked a developer to move an icon five pixels to the right, and he told me it would take ten days. That made me look closer at the real cost of maintaining the Dynamics CRM UI and the complexity hidden behind seemingly simple changes.
Process:
I first researched whether Microsoft already had an accessible controls library we could reuse, but there was no suitable shared foundation available. I then audited the product, identified roughly ten major controls that appeared across web, tablet, and mobile experiences, and started designing them across multiple form factors. I also did rough calculations of how much time and money we were spending to support all those variations, then pitched the simplification opportunity to a VP. For about six months, I drove the initiative mostly on my own before another designer joined.
Challenge:
The shared controls library had to support a large and messy set of enterprise requirements: Windows, iOS, and Android; phone, tablet, and web form factors; accessibility; existing backend architecture; custom settings and business rules; 100+ user scenarios; 20+ user types; users' concerns and expectations; and strict time and resource constraints.
Result:
My main contribution as the design lead was creating a shared library of controls, including detailed guidance for how each control should behave across different form factors, states, and layouts—for example, expanded vs. collapsed views. The controls were intentionally clean and neutral, so they could serve as a common foundation across products.
In parallel, I led another initiative with vendor teams reporting to me to explore how these controls could be styled for different customer branding needs. We also designed customization options that gave customers more control over the product's look and feel.
The initiative reduced development, QA, maintenance, and support costs by replacing duplicated controls and patterns with a shared foundation. It also standardized related user flows across Dynamics CRM, Field Service, Marketing, Contact Center, and mobile and desktop applications. This likely reduced user confusion and support-center calls, while saving several million dollars per year in duplicated engineering, QA, maintenance, and support effort.
Fun fact:
What started as one designer questioning the cost of moving an icon eventually grew into a platform-level effort with hundreds of people across the organization contributing to and building on the shared system.
There were hundreds of screens in visual, conceptual, and wireframe format. I'll just show some here.