SUMMARY

Intuit is a financial software company that helps its users achieve financial confidence, prepare taxes, bolster small businesses, and improve personal financial management.

As a Product Design Intern on the Virtual Expert Platform Team (VEP), I piloted a cross-functional project, designing a new feature to help tax experts seamlessly track their client status within the Intuit Expert Platform.

WHAT DID I DO?

🔎 UX RESEARCH

👩‍💻 UX DESIGN

Created a research plan and administered 3 user interviews with stakeholders

Verified the existing usability of the product
Ensured that the feature remedied user pain points of time consumption and difficulty of use

Designed and validated different workflows and ideal state designs through 12 interface iterations

Consistently engaged with developers, product manager, interaction designers, and content designers

MY EXPERIENCE

🎉 STEP 0: GET OFFER, CELEBRATE, AND FLEX THE NEW INTERN SWAG

Phew, got the job! After calling all my friends and family, there was one thing left to do: play with all my intern goodies.

✈️ STEP 1: DETROIT → SAN FRANCISCO

Time to conquer the fear of heights. But first, quick selfie for mom.

👩‍💻 STEP 2: WORK, LEARN, AND MAKE FRIENDS

Looking at these while it’s freezing in Ann Arbor…missing the warm California weather.

🤸‍♀️ STEP 3: BONDING + FUN!

We had a ton of exciting opportunities, from learning about Argentine street art to doing the Instagram takeover for National Intern Day!

KEY TAKEAWAYS

❌ YOU ARE NOT THE USER

💪 START EARLY, FAIL EARLY

It is extremely important to address your biases when beginning a design – you cannot assume that everyone who will use your product shares your level of technical literacy and context. Research and testing is critical.

You can’t sit and wait for the perfect idea to hit you. The design process is not always linear, and changes or new requirements can come out of nowhere. Sometimes it takes designing the wrong thing to help you get one step closer to designing the right thing.