Your Hearing Network

Stakeholder Interviews

The path to understanding YHN’s target users began with learning why the first portal failed to convert. A change of business direction warranted a reprioritization of user personas determined through several stakeholder interviews and workshops.

User Profiles

Practice owners, providers, and office managers emerged as key personas. I captured user behaviors, motivators, pain points, and goals in user personas before defining user stories, which we used to define and prioritize project scope.

Card Sorting & Sitemap

A series of workshops and card exercises shaped user flows, navigational paths, and concepts for practice tools. The team collaborated with stakeholders to iterate on concepts for prototyping.

Wireframes

Sitemaps and user flows illustrated final navigation and task paths. These artifacts directed the approach for wireframes, which illustrated information architecture, critical interactions, and how to guide users through task flows.

I translated YHN’s brand identity to a design system comprising of responsive components appropriate for advanced user interactions. Graphs and charts visualized dry tabular data, self-guided tutorials supported user onboarding, and responsible design ensured a consistent desktop-to-mobile experience.

I tested specific wireframe flows with practice owners and back-office users to validate the intuitiveness of the solution. Feedback warranted further simplification of user flows and clarification of system feedback.

Outcomes

• High Ease Of Navigation: In a post-launch beta survey, 86% of users reported that the portal was easy to navigate, validating the information architecture.
• Understandable Content: 89% of users found the portal’s information straightforward, indicating strong alignment between content structure, data presentation, and user expectations.
• Strong Visual Design: 78% of users rated the user interface as highly pleasing to look at and use, reinforcing confidence in the visual system and interaction patterns.
• Sustained User Engagement: Active users anticipated new features, showing strong adoption and long-term engagement.

Learnings & Reflections

• Focus on Data Quality: UX alone cannot resolve data inconsistencies; prioritize data quality, content strategy, and user needs from the start.
• Design For Mobile: Mobile usage will continue to grow, making it essential to future-proof experiences, even when initial usage skews desktop.
• Prioritize Experience Over Fidelity: In hindsight, investing more time validating end-to-end experience flows and less time on mid-fidelity wireframes would have delivered stronger results.
• Advocate For Continuous Research: Additional user testing — particularly in later phases — would have further ensured usability and clarity.  Incorporating the customer’s voice early is critical; without it, teams risk shipping experiences that fail to meet real needs.