UX Was Here

UX enthusiasts lacked a dedicated platform to connect, learn, and grow together. As the sole designer, I led UX Was Here from concept to launch—a social platform combining forums, job discovery, events, and networking for UX professionals. The platform attracted 400+ signups and built a newsletter audience of 300+ subscribers with 50%+ open rates, while managing distributed teams of 12-16 student developers across multiple cohorts.

The UX community was scattered across generic platforms that didn't serve their specific needs. Students and early-career professionals faced imposter syndrome on professional networks like LinkedIn, while job opportunities were fragmented across multiple sites. There was no dedicated space for UX-specific discussions, mentorship, or community support for career growth. Geographic barriers further limited global collaboration, and students felt intimidated asking "basic" questions in spaces dominated by senior professionals.

Platform analytics revealed a critical challenge: 96.46% of users were getting stuck at the waitlist page with minimal engagement on core features. The few who made it through showed strong interest—the Jobs page had the longest engagement time—but we were losing potential community members before they even experienced the platform's value.

As the sole product designer at UX Was Here (under Omnia Consulting), I was responsible for:

I started by distributing anonymous surveys in Discord UX communities, collecting 20+ responses from students and early-career professionals. The research revealed that imposter syndrome was the #1 barrier to community participation. Students desperately needed safe spaces for "basic" questions without judgment, with portfolio feedback and job discovery being their top priorities. They wanted curated, relevant content over information overload, and while they valued geographic diversity, time zones created friction for real-time collaboration.

I analyzed four existing UX platforms to identify gaps in the market. Vancouver Designers had strong local networking but limited digital engagement tools. Design Buddies excelled at mentorship but was missing job discovery features. Iterate UX focused on skill-building but lacked community discussion spaces. ADPlist was excellent for 1:1 mentoring but offered no group collaboration.

The gap was clear: no single platform combined community forums, job discovery, events, and networking in one cohesive experience tailored specifically for the UX community.

Given resource constraints, I maintained a lean design process, creating 3-5 different iterations for each key feature. I tested prototypes with student cohorts during development sprints, using Figma for all wireframing and prototyping. This iterative approach allowed us to validate ideas quickly and make adjustments based on real user feedback without extensive overhead.

Platform analytics revealed a critical problem: 96.46% of visitors were stuck at the waitlist page, with only 1.61% reaching the Jobs page. I conducted user journey analysis to identify drop-off points, A/B tested different onboarding approaches with student cohorts, and surveyed waitlisted users about their barriers to engagement.

The solution focused on showing immediate value. I redesigned the onboarding to highlight job alerts and upcoming events right away, added social proof showing active community engagement, and implemented progressive disclosure to reduce overwhelm. The key was creating "quick win" moments in the first session that demonstrated the platform's value before asking for deeper commitment.

As the sole designer leading 4 cohorts totaling 12-16 students with varying work styles and short tenures, I faced the challenge of maintaining consistency and momentum. I created detailed PRDs that gave students ownership over task selection, organized teams into frontend/backend pairs for accountability, and implemented Jira for transparent project tracking.

The biggest lesson: community-building requires sustained effort and stability. Student cohorts brought fresh energy, but the short rotation periods made long-term engagement difficult. The challenge wasn't the design—it was maintaining consistency with a constantly rotating team.

Keeping a community engaged requires consistent content—jobs, events, articles—but we had limited team capacity. I launched a Substack newsletter to centralize content delivery, which grew from 0 to 300+ subscribers in under a year while maintaining 50%+ open rates through curated, relevant content. I also automated event scraping where possible and built affiliate partnerships for sustainable revenue.

Partnership Impact

We partnered with SFU as case sponsors for their Enunoia Design Jam, a 2-day intensive where I defined the core retention challenge for student teams. The jam attracted over 100 participants and generated 25 design submissions addressing onboarding and engagement issues. While budget constraints prevented us from implementing these solutions, the partnership successfully built awareness in the academic design community and created a talent pipeline for future collaborations.

Community Building

Beyond the platform itself, I established the Substack newsletter as a reliable source for UX jobs and events within the community. It created a safe space for student discussions and questions, connected UX professionals across international markets (Canada, India, US), and demonstrated the viability of a student-centric UX platform even when platform engagement lagged.

Inspired by "Kilroy was here" graffiti

The founder of UX Was Here, who also runs Omnia Consulting, once conducted a guerrilla UX experiment in a company cafeteria serving 1,500+ employees daily. Observing the chaotic lunch lines, he rearranged the food flow after hours and left one mark: "UX was here!"

The next day, efficiency transformed. Conversations sparked. An internal team formed to improve employee experience. This simple experiment became the philosophy behind UX Was Here—demonstrating how individual UX practitioners can create ripple effects of positive change in their communities.

UX Was Here aimed to scale that impact globally, creating a platform where designers could connect, collaborate, and carry forward that spirit of grassroots problem-solving.