Challenges
GivingData serves a diverse audience of more than 99,000 users and 165 foundations. The platform facilitates complex workflows for grants management and grantee engagement, supporting 29,000+ grant payments worth $4.9 billion in 2024 alone. Designing at this scale presents unique challenges:
- Supporting varied user roles, including foundation staff, grantseekers, and executives, with distinct goals and workflows.
- Ensuring a consistent and seamless experience across a rapidly evolving product suite.
- Maintaining accessibility and usability while scaling features to meet increasing demand.
My Approach
User-Centered Product Design
Since joining GivingData in 2016, I have designed numerous features for its grants management platform and grantee portal, addressing critical user needs.
Home screen redesign: I led the redesign of the grants management home screen, introducing configurable widgets that allow administrators to tailor the experience to their team’s needs. These widgets surface key data, such as recently viewed records or critical tasks, enabling foundation staff to work more efficiently and stay organized.
Building a Scalable Design System
To support GivingData’s growth, I spearheaded the creation of its first comprehensive design system, Paradigm. This system provides:
- Design standards: Foundational elements, including colors, typography, and layout, ensure visual consistency across the product suite.
- UI component library: Reusable components, such as buttons, forms, and tables, accelerate design and development while maintaining a high standard of quality.
- Accessibility guidelines: Documentation ensures compliance with WCAG standards, making the platform usable for all users.
The adoption of Paradigm has streamlined the design and development process, enabling the team to deliver features faster while improving the overall user experience.
Solutions
- Efficient workflows: The configurable home screen empowers users to access the data they need quickly, reducing friction and saving time.
- Consistency at scale: Paradigm has established a unified visual and functional language, supporting GivingData’s rapid growth while delivering a cohesive user experience.
- Accessibility and flexibility: The design system ensures the platform is inclusive and adaptable to evolving user needs.
Impact
- User base: Serving 99,000+ users and 165 foundations.
- Grant facilitation: In 2024, the platform supported 29,000+ grant payments worth $4.9 billion.
- Efficiency gains: The design system has reduced the time required to design and implement new features, speeding up delivery and improving the user experience.
- User satisfaction: Configurable features and accessible designs have improved user engagement and satisfaction across roles.