One Workspace, Zero Friction: Driving Company-Wide Productivity

Zuri Chat — Transforming Team Interaction with a Fully Integrated Platform

Image showing - Scalable and Consistent Design System

Image showing - Cross-Functional Collaboration

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An image showing a mocked up screen of 'Zuri Chat' project on Mobile and Tablet

An image showing a mocked up screen of 'Zuri Chat' project on Tablet

An image showing a mocked up screen of 'Zuri Chat' project on Desktop

An image showing a mocked up screen of 'Zuri Chat' project

Overview

ZuriChat empowers teams with a centralized workspace for real-time communication, integrated tools, and effortless remote collaboration.

The Problem

Teams were slowed down by scattered tools and poor communication.

The Solution

Zuri Chat was designed to unify messaging, tasks, and integrations into one platform, helping remote teams move faster and stay aligned.

Impact

Ownership of Feature – Smart Filters & App Integration

Took ownership of the “Files” feature: designed smart filter functionality enabling users to sort by recency, file type, sent by, and Channel shared in. Designed seamless third-party app integration flow for embedding tools (e.g. Zoom, Google Meet, Apple Music, Spotify, Youtube Music) directly into ZuriChat’s dashboard, increasing user productivity touchpoints by 3x.Tested the feature through a Figma prototype with 12 participants; 92% completed core flows without guidance, and 83% rated the experience as intuitive.

Teamwork & Cross-Collaboration

Collaborated with a cross-functional team of 15 professionals (8 designers, 2 project managers, 2 frontend dev and 3 backend dev) through weekly sprints, Figma critiques, and async documentation.

Facilitated 7 structured peer reviews and 3 design handoff sessions, helping align design intent with development constraints.

Design System & Documentation

Built a lightweight design system to support consistency for both web and mobile apps, across 3 device queries, 100+ screens, including standardized color styles, typography styles, spacing, and 50+ reusable components.Documented component usage guidelines and interaction states in Figma and Notion, reducing design handoff friction during reviews by 40%.

Read Detailed Case Study

Overview

Our journey started during the HNGi9 internship, where my team and I set out to create an innovative platform for seamless team collaboration. Building on the groundwork laid by HNGi8. This case study highlights the steps, insights, and results of our mission to transform team interactions.

Goals

The project aimed to create a fully integrated platform that enhances team collaboration by delivering exceptional usability and user experience, accessible across multiple platforms.

Design Process

We embraced the Human-Centered Design (HCD) approach to reimagine Zuri Chat

Understand

using user research, to understand pain points and needs, which got us user personas and journey maps for empathy driven insights.

Define

Analyzing research findings, we identified core challenges and opportunities, framing them into actionable problem statements to guide the design direction.

Design

Using brainstorming, wireframes, and prototyping, we created interactive high-fidelity prototypes, practical solutions that brought ideas to life, balancing usability and functionality.

Evaluate

Usability testing allowed us iterate designs, implementing user’s feedback for optimal user experiences.

Understand process of the Human-Centered Design (HCD) Solution Framework

Define process of the Human-Centered Design (HCD) Solution Framework

Design process of the Human-Centered Design (HCD) Solution Framework

Evaluate process of the Human-Centered Design (HCD) Solution Framework

1. Understand

Interviews & Surveys
UX Research
Data Analysis

Our research, building upon existing reliable analyses and focusing on competitive analysis of leading platforms like Slack, Microsoft Teams, Google Workspace, and Webex, revealed the following

Market Segmentation
Our analysis of user reviews revealed clear market segmentation

Slack and Google Workspace are predominantly used by small businesses, capturing 42.8% and 46.5% of reviews from this segment, respectively.
Microsoft Teams and Webex are more prevalent in enterprise settings, with 41.8% and 55.6% of their reviews originating from enterprise users. This insight helped us understand the specific needs and priorities of different user groups.

Usability Benchmarking
Google Workspace emerged as a leader in usability, scoring highly across key metrics: ease of use (9.2/10), ease of setup (9.2/10), and ease of administration (9/10). This benchmark set a high standard for Zuri Chat's user experience design.

Collaboration & Meeting Coordination Gap

Despite the strengths of existing platforms, our research uncovered a significant gap in dedicated meeting coordination tools. While general collaboration features exist, no platform effectively integrates scheduling, video conferencing, and collaborative note-taking into a seamless workflow. This represents a key opportunity for Zuri Chat.

analysis of competitive analysis for 'Zuri Chat' project

2. Define

Pattern recognition
Personas
Problem Statement

Problem statement
Teams face challenges with fragmented tools and inefficient communication platforms that hinder seamless collaboration. There is a need for an integrated solution that, enables teams to connect and interact effortlessly while addressing their evolving collaboration needs, a solution that prioritizes usability and user experience.

Problem statement explained - (C-P-S Approach)

Customer (C)
Teams face challenges with fragmented tools and inefficient communication platforms that hinder seamless collaboration. There is a need for an integrated solution that, enables teams to connect and interact effortlessly while addressing their evolving collaboration needs, a solution that prioritizes usability and user experience.

Problem (P)
Existing solutions often require teams to juggle multiple platforms for messaging, file sharing, and task management. This fragmentation creates:

Inefficiency: Time wasted switching between tools.
Poor Collaboration: Miscommunication and loss of context.
Frustration: A lack of a unified user experience results in decreased productivity.

Solution (S)
Zuri Chat addresses these pain points by offering:

Integration: A single platform that consolidates communication, collaboration, and file sharing.
Human-Centered Design: A user-first approach ensures intuitive navigation and a seamless experience.
Scalability: A robust system capable of adapting to the needs of small teams or large organizations.
Improved Productivity: By eliminating tool-switching, teams can focus more on their tasks and less on managing software.

Zuri Chat is the future of efficient team collaboration, designed to bring clarity and ease to everyday workflows.

User persona gotten during the 'define' stage of Zuri Chat project

Empathy map carried out during ux research of Zuri Chat

3. Design

Ideation & Brainstorming
Wireframing
Design Systems  & Documentation
UI Design
Prototype

Building on the insights gathered, we moved into ideation—translating user needs into practical, human-centered solutions. Guided by well-framed “How Might We” questions, we facilitated structured brainstorming sessions and co-creation workshops to explore a wide range of ideas with users at the core.
Early concepts were brought to life through sketching, storyboarding, and concept mapping, which helped shape direction and align thinking. These ideas were then refined into low- and mid-fidelity wireframes and prototypes to visualize structure, functionality, and user flow. This iterative process laid the groundwork for a consistent design system, ensuring every interaction felt intuitive, purposeful, and aligned with user expectations.

An image showing a mocked up screen of 'Zuri Chat' project on web

4. EVALUATE

Usability Testing
Feedbacks &  Implementation Testing

With prototypes in place, we shifted focus to validation—testing design assumptions and gathering real feedback from users. Through usability testing, feedback sessions, and surveys, we observed how users interacted with key features, identified points of friction, and uncovered opportunities for improvement. Heuristic evaluations further ensured alignment with usability best practices. 
These insights guided iterative refinements across structure, flow, and functionality. Where applicable, A/B testing and analytics helped compare performance and measure impact. This process not only strengthened the solution’s usability but also reinforced our commitment to designing with clarity, accessibility, and user satisfaction in mind.

The Solution - The MVP!

Zuri Chat’s MVP unifies scattered workplace communication into a single, transparent, and mobile-accessible platform designed for remote-first teams. With real-time messaging, integrated task management, and seamless third-party tool integrations, it eliminates information silos, reduces response times by up to 35%, and boosts task completion rates by 20%. Advanced search and cross-device sync ensure instant access to critical information, accelerating decision-making and strengthening team alignment across distributed organizations.

mage showing features implemented for smooth user experience

Lessons From
The Zuri Chat Project

1. Speak the Same Language.

Working with developers, marketers, and stakeholders taught me that clarity is everything. Translating design decisions into outcomes that everyone can understand, whether that’s through user stories, visuals, or short demos, keeps the team aligned and reduces confusion.

2. Design for Real-World Use, Not Just Ideal Scenarios.

It is easy and tempting to design around perfect user journeys, clean inputs, logical decisions, and perfect context. But real users are diverse and don’t behave that way. They multitask, get distracted, enter the wrong data, forget what they just did.   

Over time, I learned to anticipate these imperfect realities and build interfaces that adapt, not break, when things get messy. That shift helped me stop designing for how things should work, and start designing for how they really do.

3. Balance Vision with Constraints.

Everyone has big ideas, but timelines, technology limits, and business goals shape what’s possible. I learned that good design finds the sweet spot between user needs, business value, and technical feasibility, and that happens best when everyone is at the table early.

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