UX Leadership by Doing
My transformation into happier, more effective, trusted, and inspiring UX leader
I began as a digital marketer and worked in the space for three years. But my deeper curiosity — understanding how people make decisions — led me to UX at a time when the term wasn’t widely known in India.
2010 - Entry into UX
I was curious to know why some experiences work and others don’t. That curiosity became my gateway to UX.
E-commerce Conversion Specialist: Optimized funnel pages using heuristics. Improved conversion rates by 2% across 8–10 clients.
​​2012-13 - Evolution as a UXer
Honeywell: Redesigned a fire alarm panel after extensive lab and field research. Learned user research, domain immersion, and organizing complex information.​
2013-21 - Leadership and transformation
Tricon Infotech: Built the design team from scratch, pitched and won projects (e.g., McGraw-Hill, Taylor & Francis), and introduced scalable UX processes.
For Taylor & Francis client, led the UX team, institutionalized the UX practice, elevated role and value of UX, and increased from 1 member team to 8 member team. Unified 22 ebook stores in to 1 Experience, reduced 8 dev teams to 1.
Introduced Design-Dev handoff framework to reduce design iterations from 4 to 2.​
2021-25 - UX Leadership at Enterprise Scale - at JSW One platforms
Large, multi-platform digital ecosystem across procurement, logistics, services, and manufacturing
Part of the JSW Group, one of India’s largest steel manufacturers
First- and fast-mover in enterprise e-commerce for steel and industrial products
Operated as a high-octane startup within a large legacy organisation
The Environment
Rapid decision-making with frequent strategic shifts
Multiple deeply integrated systems evolving in parallel
High scale and operational complexity from day one
Continuous pressure to balance enterprise rigor with startup agility
What UX Needed to Be
Handle heavy organisational complexity, not just interface design
Move fast while designing for scale and long-term stability
Make decisions with incomplete information and evolving priorities
Design across multiple integrated systems, not isolated products
Act as the connective tissue across business, product, engineering, and operations
Bring alignment and clarity as the only decentralised function
Phase 1
Entry Project - Connecting Sellers and Buyers
I joined as UX Head, but worked fully hands-on from day one, at a time when no UX function existed.
Two parallel initiatives were ready to start immediately: the Seller Portal and E-commerce 2.0.
Seller Portal — Self-Serve Operations
The seller portal was conceived to enable sellers to independently run their enterprise stores and sell products on the e-commerce platform without operational assistance.
I worked closely with product and business teams to define the feature scope and designed the complete system end-to-end. As scale increased, screens were expanded with support from a contract designer.
Key capabilities
Product upload and management
Price updates
Incoming order management
Delivery milestone management
Business insights and reporting
The platform was tested with 4 sellers, all of whom validated the usability and value.
Following this, category teams adopted the tool to reduce operational overhead.
Inception of the UX Team
While the seller portal was being built, the announcement of MSME Website 2.0 made the need for a dedicated UX function immediate.
I initiated the UX team setup, which eventually scaled to 5 designers, enabling parallel delivery across products.
Scaling the Marketplace (E-commerce 2.0)
The existing e-commerce website, designed by an external agency before I joined, was not built for scale.
It lacked reusability, a component system, and support for expansion beyond steel products.
Limitations of the existing site
Not designed for scale or future expansion
No component system or design consistency
Limited reusability across pages and flows
Focused only on steel, with no support for other enterprise products
Lacked mobile responsiveness
How 2.0 was reimagined
Shifted the experience from catalogue-driven to discovery-led
Redesigned navigation and information hierarchy for enterprise-scale browsing
Refreshed the marketplace to improve clarity and credibility
Designed for multiple enterprise products beyond steel
Introduced mobile responsiveness, missing in the earlier version
It was designed as mobile first unlike the older website
A key change was treating the homepage as a discovery surface, not just a landing page:
Introduced section-based discovery to break monotony
Enabled exploration across enterprise product categories
Phase 2 - Stabilising the Marketplace (Reinventing 1.0)
As E-commerce 2.0 progressed, management decisions and shifting priorities required the existing marketplace to continue supporting the business in parallel.
Rather than waiting on a future state, the focus shifted to strengthening and stabilising the current platform so it could scale reliably.
What was addressed
Improved homepage discovery and product exploration
Fixed and recreated the design system within existing technical constraints
Made targeted visual and interaction improvements to improve marketplace credibility
Optimised product pages for clarity and decision-making
Redesigned checkout, order summary, payments, and delivery tracking flows
Phase 3 - Pricing Engine (Solving Scale & Availability)
The pricing engine was born out of pricing and availability failures on the website.
As the marketplace scaled, it became operationally impossible for teams to manually manage pricing across 18,000 variants spanning 7–8 product categories. Frequent changes across regions, order sizes, delivery types, and business rules made manual updates slow, error-prone, and unreliable.
The problem wasn’t UI — it was scale and decision complexity.
What the pricing engine enabled
Sellers entered a single base price
Automatic price updates across all product variants
Rule-based pricing applied across:
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Regions
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Order sizes
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Delivery types
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Other predefined business criteria
We partnered closely with sales and product teams to define and validate this logic as a scalable system, not a set of screens.
Phase 3 - One HX Framework
As the organisation scaled rapidly, UX work became fragmented across teams, products, and timelines. Decisions were inconsistent, feedback loops were weak, and design outcomes depended heavily on individual context rather than shared systems.
To address this, I designed One HX — a unified UX framework to institutionalise how design decisions are made, reviewed, and delivered across the organisation.
The framework was built around a simple but critical goal:
enable speed without sacrificing clarity, quality, or accountability.
Impact
Design delivery speed improved by 50%, with fewer last-minute changes
Iterations reduced from 7–8 unstructured rounds to 3 structured iterations with clear stage exits
Introduced a 24-hour feedback window with structured critique sessions
Established a clear “Ready for Grooming” marker, reducing post-handoff revisions
Design time formally recognised in planning, retros, and OKRs, improving stakeholder alignment
Phase 4 - Research-led Adoption (Changing the Adoption Game)
Customer research showed that full platform adoption wasn’t possible early on because ordering wasn’t always reliable due to pricing and availability gaps. As a result, users didn’t engage end-to-end — they returned for specific, high-trust tasks.
Key research outcomes
Users struggled to procure order documents reliably
Trust was higher for specific tasks than for end-to-end ordering
Forcing full workflows increased friction; task-based access reduced it
What we redesigned
Order documents made a first-class, easily accessible feature
Post-order experience redesigned to support repeat usage
Reordering flows aligned to real customer intent
Contextual discovery surfaced around availability and next actions
Watch it as a video
Watch both parts of the case study in video format.
Each change acted as an adoption hook, bringing users back for a clear, trusted purpose.
Measured impact
90% of customers accessed order documents via the platform
50% stopped maintaining separate digital copies
40% used platform documents for audits and tax filings
30–35% reduction in customer support queries related to orders and documents
This shifted adoption from a one-time expectation to a progressive, trust-led behaviour.
Phase 5 - JSW One Homes
In my final phase, I went fully hands-on end-to-end, owning design execution directly.
I upskilled myself deeply in Figma and AI-assisted design workflows and delivered the JSW One Homes website from scratch.
Alongside delivery, I set standards for mandating AI in the design process, improving both speed and quality.
Impact
~30% reduction in overall design effort
Faster execution without compromising craft
Improved design consistency and output quality
What I Love and Believe
What I Love
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Creating teams and design processes
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System thinking
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Product thinking and management
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Design transformation at scale
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Institutionalizing UX practice
My Leadership Philosophy
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Inclusivity
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Ownership
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Warmth
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Fun
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Collaboration
Reinvention: Why I Chose to Transform
Between 2019 and 2022,
I was a full-time people manager. But I realized that wasn’t scalable. Leadership can become timeless only when you lead by example, and by doing, and adopting that mindset has made me a happier, more effective leader.
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I also saw that to truly match the wavelength of younger team members, I needed to be as agile and dynamic as they are. This meant going beyond management — getting back into the craft, having skin in the game, and showing leadership through action.
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By 2023, I made a deliberate shift:
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Relearned Figma from scratch — including automation features to speed up design workflows.
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Took on a full hands-on project and delivered an entire website solo, end-to-end.
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Returned to the craft to understand speed, nuance, and real-world execution constraints.
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Professionally
I returned to individual contribution — designing, prototyping, and delivering end-to-end — while still leading teams through influence, example, and guidance.
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Physically
Lost 10 kg, built strength and agility, and developed the discipline to stay focused and energetic.
Mentally
Adopted a growth mindset and replaced hierarchy with collaboration.
Philosophically
I’ve grown closer to my team — not by intervening, but by supporting. I ensure they’re heading in the right direction while encouraging ownership. They know they have someone to fall back on.
In the last year, I also transformed physically and mentally:
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Dropped from 83 kg to 73 kg
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Gained strength, mobility, and agility
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Embraced yoga, meditation, and mental fitness
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Recovered from depression and rebuilt discipline
I now operate with renewed clarity — and match the energy of younger, faster teams with ease.
Embracing AI in My Practice
I didn’t use AI just for chatting or quick ideas — I integrated it deeply into my UX workflow.
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Generated content, copy, and research structures
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Created illustrations, icons, and layout suggestions
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Used AI to brainstorm wireframes and interaction ideas
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Used AI to critique my own designs for improvement
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Adopted AI to generate better solutions, faster and more effectively — saving time and reducing waste
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Also, picked up vibe coding to build an app to support my hobby.
I made AI my design partner, not just a shortcut.
How I Will Add Value
Systems Thinking, Not Just Solutions
I see design as an interconnected ecosystem — products, services, and people all working in sync. I work with clients as a design partner, not just a service provider, applying systems thinking to address the real problems, not just their symptoms. Every solution I design balances user needs with business goals, delivering measurable outcomes.
Leadership by Doing — With Influence, Not Control
I lead from the front — staying hands-on, delivering projects end-to-end, and keeping “skin in the game.” This keeps me grounded in the realities my team faces and makes me a better, happier, and more effective leader. My approach builds trust, fosters ownership, and ensures my teams feel safe, autonomous, and inspired — while maintaining harmony and high performance.
Human Experience at the Core
I design with both functional and emotional needs in mind. My goal is to create experiences that delight, connect, and perform — ensuring every design not only works but resonates deeply with the people it serves.
Agility Without Compromise
Physically, mentally, and philosophically, I’m in the best shape of my life. I can match the speed of high-performing teams, maintain quality standards, and lead with energy, empathy, and resilience — meeting deadlines without sacrificing harmony or creativity.
Some Notable Case Studies
Designing the One HX Framework
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Improved delivery speed by 50%
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Reduced iterations from 7–8 unstructured rounds to 3 structured iterations
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Cut feedback turnaround to 24 hours with structured critique sessions
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Reduced handoff back-and-forth with dev teams by ~60%
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Changing the Adoption Game
an evidence of system thinking
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90% of customers accessing documents directly from the orders panel.
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50% discontinuing their own digital copies, reducing duplication.
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40% using the documents feature for tax filing and audits, making it a critical part of their business workflow.
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Being Hands-On at JSW One Homes
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Created a design system from scratch, ensuring consistency and scalability.
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Made AI my design partner — generating content, images, wireframe structures, design patterns, and visual standards.
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Developed visual design ideas and used AI to give myself structured visual feedback for continuous improvement.
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Saved at least 20% in effort and reduced wastage by streamlining workflows with AI-assisted design.
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Elevated the overall design quality through faster iteration cycles and richer visual exploration.
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Used this project as a live example for the team to adopt hands-on, AI-augmented workflows.
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Case study under development