The design process

Ideating, testing, and partnerships

No matter how big or small, the thought process to accomplish a design follows similar steps. The start of any design should establish what human needs will be served. This is founded on user research and business needs. From there, I consider every idea my team and I can come up with during a limited amount of time. This allows us to assess what might be the appropriate direction, including if it's by way of revelations on ideas that don’t work.

Ideas aren’t enough — it is important to get feedback. Of course, a strong partnership with UX researchers will collect the most critical feedback to iterate on the design. However, strong relationships with other designers and partners will allow for rich feedback and alternative perspectives. I organized the design critiques at Delta Dental that facilitated feedback in this way. This was critical in the design for the Delta Dental member experience.

Accessibility, repeatability, and responsiveness

Embedding the values through the process, not just the end

Accessibility is especially important when it affects someone’s ability to get patient care. This means we needed to consider our design’s accessibility before we even created wireframes. This was achieved by understanding low or non-sighted users can best experience our design.

To achieve this, my UX team founded Emerald. Emerald was our design system based on creating repeatable, consistent, and brand-compliant designs across Delta Dental’s digital portfolio. This included establishing an 8-pixel baseline grid, a design process to ensure usability and accessibility for every component, and guidelines to minimize misuse of components.

In addition to usability and accessibility, the design system also facilitated the responsiveness of our designs. This means each we established breakpoints for mobile and desktop viewports as well as guidelines for using components in each.

Membership outside of the dentist’s office

Still serving Delta Dental members when dentists are not treating them

Dental plan usage

"What is remaining of my insurance coverage?"

“What did my plan even do?”

Reporting how plans are helping

“What’s going on?”

Keeping members informed and aware