The modern tech scene is structured and built around collaboration. The ecosystem thrives on cocreation much to the extent that design is no longer considered as «nice to have» or a delayed intervention for beautification. Likewise, addressing a business or market challenge only through the lens of technology no longer delivers enduring or viable solutions.

Providing valuable expertise to the team and the company results in usable and impactful products for the end-user. The designer's role to join the business, technology and user needs is as crucial as the keystone in an archway.

The product designer is responsible for the process of creating a product or a feature beginning with defining the problem of real users followed by imagining possible solutions. A good example of adding a new feature to an existing product could be inserting shopping onto Instagram or the possibility to learn courses on LinkedIn.

As you can imagine, week after week, the system increases in complexity. That is why keeping things simple for the user is one of the primary goals of product designers. Assessing how the product works and proposing improvements is a constant endeavor.

How does a workweek look like for a designer at a PropTech start-up or any other tech ecosystem?

1) At the beginning of each project, we give center stage to user research.
That is by facilitating interviews, meeting in focus groups or sending out surveys to learn more about the problem or the user needs we are trying to serve.

2) We then analyse the findings and define hypotheses. This helps us to frame the problem and set the stage for innovation, or as we like to call it, divergence.

3) Next comes ideation. We set out to explore different options and solutions to the problem at hand. These can be preliminary designs, famously known as wireframes and prototypes.

4) We then test these designs with real users. Our main focus is to assess the functionality of the product as a whole. In plain terms: does the design work or break?

5) According to the results obtained, we reiterate and improve the designs. As simple as it sounds, it is not a linear process but rather a dynamic and repetitive one.

6) All along the process, we communicate our learnings with the team of developers and product managers to make sure that we all have a common understanding. Remember, product teams thrive on co-creation!

At the end of this dynamic process, we have learned a lot. We discovered the product needs on several layers, we’ve created a strong foundation and reasoning for upcoming designs and have a prototype tested with real users. At this point, we can decide to move further and develop the idea or to abandon the whole thing. After all, we have enough information to make either decision.

7) The product or feature is now out to market. Real users can use it publicly and extensively. Our work in the team does not and should not end here, though. Previous to launching the product, we decide on a couple of success metrics that can enable us to assess whether the product/feature is functioning as it should. One example of a success metric could be to focus on the percentage of users that drop out. We can then look closely at what is causing the dropout and find a way to address it.

The design process is now complete. The feature is out, the product is growing, and we now have a fully functional product that will be improved and tended to time and time again. As we saw, the work of product designers played a fundamental role in this journey, and this is why at PriceHubble we believe in cultivating a solid design culture so we can create successful products that delight our customers and our users, and drive development in businesses large and small.

Are you interested in learning more about how we integrate design at PriceHubble? Check out this article by our very own Alexandra Negrut talking about running user feedback sessions.